Читать книгу Sealed With a Kiss - Gwynne Forster, Gwynne Forster - Страница 7

Chapter 1

She burrowed deeper into her pillow, hoping to silence the persistent ringing in her ear. Finally, she gave up trying to sleep and reached for the phone.

“It’s six-thirty in the morning. Would whoever you are please go back to sleep?”

“Gal, I want you to come over here right away. There’s something I ought to tell you.” Naomi sighed and sat up in bed. The Reverend Judd Logan’s commands did not perturb Naomi. She had dealt with her paternal grandfather’s whims and orders since she was seven years old, when he became her guardian and she went to live with him. She tumbled out of bed, her eyes still heavy with sleep, and groped for the bathroom. She hadn’t asked him whether it was urgent: of course it was. To him, everything was urgent. And you never knew what to expect when you received his summons, but you could be certain that you were supposed to treat it as if it came from a court of law. She smiled despite herself. She was twenty-nine years old, but she was still a child as far as he was concerned. However, because she loved him, she didn’t have trouble with that. After all, there was nearly a seventy-year difference in their ages. Thoughts of his age gave her a moment of anxiety; his call really could be urgent. She dressed hurriedly, remembering to take a light jacket. Early mornings in October were sometimes chilly.

The drive from her condominium in Bethesda, Maryland, across Washington to Alexandria, Virginia, were her grandfather lived, took half an hour even at that time of morning. She parked her gray Taurus in front of her grandfather’s imposing Tudor-style home and rang the doorbell before letting herself in. Judd Logan didn’t like surprises. If you handed him one, he lectured you for an hour.

She entered the foyer dragging her feet, wondering at her sudden feeling of apprehension. The spacious vestibule had been her favorite childhood haunt, because her grandfather had put a console piano there for her and always placed little gifts and surprises on it. She would look up from her practice and notice him listening raptly, though he never told her that he enjoyed her playing. The piano remained, but it held no attraction; her childhood had ended abruptly when she was sixteen.

She found him in his study, writing his memoirs, and walked over to hug him, but he dusted her off with a gruff “Not now, gal, wait until I finish this sentence.” How typical of him to shun affection, she thought; not once in the nearly twenty-two years since she had gone to live with him had he ever made a gesture toward her that she could confuse with true emotional warmth. She knew that he locked his feelings inside, but she wished he would learn a little something about affection before he left this earth. At times, she’d give anything for a hug from him—or from just about anybody. For some odd reason, this was one of those times.

With a sigh, she sat down, perusing the snow-white curly hair that framed his dark, barely lined face and the piercing hazel-brown eyes that seemed to reflect a knowledge of all the ages gone by.

“What’s this about, Grandpa? You seemed a little agitated.”

He turned his writing pad upside down, drew a deep breath, and plunged in without preliminaries. “I’ve had two letters from them and yesterday I finally got a phone call. It’s about the baby.”

She jerked forward. “The baby? What baby? Who called you?”

The old man looked at her, and a sense of dread invaded her as she saw his pity and realized it was for her. “Yours, gal. I tried back then to spare you this. I thought that since the adoption papers were sealed by law, no one would ever know. But they found me, and that means they can find you, too. The adoptive mother says that the child wants to find its birth mother.” She saw him wince and knew that the lifelessness that she felt was mirrored in her face.

“Grandpa, I’ve lived as a single woman with no children, and I’ve worked to help young girls avoid experiencing what I went through. I’m a role model. How can I explain this?” She pushed back the temptation to scream. “I knew I shouldn’t have given in to their pressure, their browbeating. The counselor at the clinic made me feel that if I didn’t give the baby up for adoption, it wouldn’t have a chance at a normal, happy life. They said a child born to a teenager starts life with two strikes against it. I was made to feel selfish and incompetent when I held out against them. But they finally convinced me, and I gave in. It didn’t help that I was depressed, and Chuck didn’t answer my letters. Grandpa, I’ve been sorry every day since I signed that paper. They didn’t even let me see the baby, said it was best to avoid any bonding. I wish you hadn’t let me do it.”

He stood and braced his back with both hands. “No point in going over that now, gal; we’ve got to deal with this last letter. Take my advice and let well enough alone. Don’t turn your life upside down; you’ll regret it.”

Naomi looked off into space, reliving those days when all that she loved had disintegrated around her. She spoke softly, forcing words from her mouth. “I’ve spent the last thirteen years trying to pretend that it never happened, but you know, Grandpa, it has still influenced every move and colored every decision that I’ve made.”

“I know, Naomi gal. But where would you be now if you had kept that child and been disgraced?” She looked around them indulgently at the replicas of bygone eras. Judd’s 1925 degree from the Yale University School of Divinity, framed in gold leaf, hung on the wall. Doilies that her grandmother had crocheted more than sixty years earlier rested on the backs of overstuffed velvet chairs. And on the floor lay the Persian carpet that the old man’s congregation had given him on his fortieth birthday. She smiled in sympathetic understanding.

“Grandpa, out-of-wedlock motherhood is not the burden for a woman that it was in your day. I tried to tell you that.”

He shook his snow-white head. “They wanted to reach the child’s biological father, too, but, well…”

“Yes.” She interrupted him gently. “I remember believing that Chuck had deserted me, and he’d drowned surfing off Honolulu. I didn’t know. I’ll never understand that, either, you know; he was a champion swimmer. I’ve wondered if he was as unhappy as I was and if it made him careless.”

“I’d feel better about this whole thing, gal, if you’d just find yourself a nice young man and get married. You ought to be married; I won’t live forever.”

She stared at him, nearly laughing. Wasn’t it typical of him to bring that up? He could weave it into a technical discussion of the pyramids of Egypt. She broke off her incredulous glare; he didn’t accept reprimands, either spoken or silent. “Get married? I’ve stayed away from men. Who would accept my having a baby, giving it up for adoption, and never bothering to tell its father? What man do you think is going to accept all that? Anyway, I’m happy just as I am, and I have no intention of offering myself to anybody for approval.”

The old man straightened up and ran a hand across his still remarkably handsome face, now nearly black from age. “A man who loves you will understand and accept it, Naomi. One who loves you, gal,” he said softly. The sentiment seemed too much for him, and he reverted to type. “You have to watch yourself. You’re moving up in that school board and working with that foundation for girls. You’re out to change the world, and you don’t need this on your neck.” She opened her mouth to speak and thought better of it. Judd had managed things for her since she was a child; she was a woman now.

“You let me handle this thing, gal, it’s best you not get involved.” She didn’t care if he mistook her silence for compliance. She had learned long ago not to argue, but she would do whatever she wanted to.

It seemed to her that the drive back to her studio on upper Connecticut Avenue in Washington took hours longer than usual; a jackknifed truck, a two-car accident, rubber necking, and the weather slowed her progress. The day was becoming one big conspiracy against her peace of mind. “Am I getting paranoid?” she asked herself, attempting to inject humor into something that wasn’t funny. Having to assume the role of mother nearly fourteen years after the fact was downright hilarious—if you were listening to a stand-up comic. She would not fall apart; she was doggoned if she would, and to prove it, she hummed every aria from La Traviata that she could remember.

She didn’t get much done that day, because she spent part of it listless and unable to concentrate and the rest optimistically shuffling harebrained schemes to locate her child. She had to adjust to a different world, one that wasn’t real, and the effort was taking a toll. She couldn’t summon her usual enthusiasm during her tutoring session that evening and could hardly wait to get home. But tomorrow would be different, she vowed. “I’m not going to keel over because of this.”

At home that evening, she curled up in her favorite chair, intent on relaxing with a cup of tea and soothing music, determined to get a handle on things. “I’m going to find something to laugh about at least once an hour,” she swore. As she searched the dial on her radio, a deep, beautifully sonorous male voice caught her attention, sending shock waves through her and raising goose bumps on her forearms. Well, he might have a bedroom voice, she quickly decided, but his ideas were a different matter. “Educated career women, including our African American women, put jobs before children and family, and that is a primary factor in family breakups and youthful delinquency,” he stated with complete confidence.

How could anyone with enough prestige to be a panelist on that program make such a claim? He was crediting women with too much responsibility for some of the world’s worst problems.

She rarely allowed herself to become furious about anything; anger crippled a person. But she had to tell him off. After trying repeatedly to telephone the radio station and getting a busy signal, she noted the station’s call letters and flipped off the radio. Meade, they’d called him. She would write him and urge him into the twentieth century.

Her immense relief at being able to concentrate on something impersonal, to feel her natural inclination to mischief surface, restored her sense of well-being. She embraced the blessed diversion and wholeheartedly went about giving Mr. Meade his comeuppance. But as she walked briskly, almost skipping to her desk, she admitted to herself that the basis for her outrage was more than intellectual. His comments had come bruisingly close to an implied indictment of her, even if she didn’t deserve it. She shrugged it off and began the letter.

“Mr. Meade,” she wrote, “I don’t know by what right you’re an authority on the family—and I doubt from your comments tonight in the program Capitol Life that you are—but you most certainly are not an authority on women. If a great many American women, and especially African American women, didn’t work outside the home, their families would starve. Would that bother you? And if you tried being a tiny bit more masculine, maybe the women with whom you associate might be ‘less aggressive,’ as you put it, softer and more feminine. Don’t you think we women have a big enough load without you dumping all that on us? Be a pal and give us a break, please. And don’t forget, Mr. Meade, even squash have fathers. Please be a good sport and don’t answer this note. Most sincerely, Naomi Logan.” She addressed it to him in care of the program and the station.

That should take care of him, she decided, already dismissing the incident. But within a week, she had his blunt reply: “Dear Ms. Logan, if you had listened to everything I said and had understood it, you might not have accused me so unfairly. From the content of your letter, it would appear that you’ve got some guilt you need to work through. Or are you apologizing for being a career woman? If the shoe fits, wear it. The lack of a reply would be much appreciated. Yours, Rufus Meade.”

Naomi hadn’t planned to pursue her argument with Rufus Meade; it was enough that she’d told him what she thought of his ideas and that her letter had annoyed him. A glance at her watch told her that the weekly radio program Capitol Life was about to begin. Curious as to whether he was a regular panelist, she tuned in. He wasn’t a regular, she learned, but had been invited back because of the clamor that his statement the previous week had caused.

The moderator introduced Rufus, who lost no time in defending his position. “Eighty percent of those who wrote or called protesting my remarks were women; most of the men thought I didn’t go far enough. Has any of you asked the children in these street gangs where their mothers are when they get home from school—provided they’re in school—what they do after school, when they last had a home-cooked meal, whether their parents know where they are? I have. Their mothers aren’t home, so they don’t know where their children are or what they’re doing. With nobody to control them, the children hang out in the street, and that is how we lose them. Children need parental guidance. When it was the norm in this society for mothers to remain at home, we had fewer social problems—less delinquency and fewer divorces. One protestor wrote me that even squash have fathers. Yes, they do. And they also have mothers who stick with them until they’re old enough to fend for themselves. In fact, the mothers die nurturing their little ones’ development.”

Naomi rubbed her fingers together in frustration. A sensible person would ignore the man and his archaic ideas. She flipped off the radio in the middle of one of his sentences. Wednesday’s mail brought another note from him.

“Dear Ms. Logan, I hope you tuned in to Capitol Life Sunday night. Some of my remarks were for your benefit. Of course, if you have a closed mind, I was merely throwing chaff to a gusty wind. Can’t say I didn’t try, though. Yours, RM.”

Excitement coursed through her as she read his note. She knew that not answering would be the best way to get the better of him. He wanted her to be annoyed, and if he didn’t hear from her, he would assume that she had lost interest. But she couldn’t resist the temptation, and she bet he was counting on that.

Her reply read, “Dear Mr. Meade, next time you’re on the air, I’d appreciate your explaining what a two-month-old squash does when it no longer needs its mother and fends for itself. (Something tells me it gets eaten.) You didn’t really mean to equate the maturity of a squash with achievement of adulthood in humans, did you? I’d try to straighten that out, if I were you. Don’t bother to write. I’ll keep tuning in to Capitol Life. Well, hang in there. Yours, NL.”

She only had to wait four days for his answer. “Dear Ms. Logan, you have deliberately misunderstood me. I stand by my position that as long as women guarded the home rather than the office and the Mack truck, juvenile crime and divorce were less frequent occurrences. You are not seriously concerned with these urgent problems, so I will not waste time writing you again. I’m assuming you’re a career woman, and my advice is to stick with your career; at least you’ll have that. Yours, RM.”

Naomi curved her mouth into a long, slow grin. She always enjoyed bedeviling straitlaced, overly serious people, though she acknowledged to herself that her cheekiness was a camouflage. It enabled her to cover her vulnerability and to shrug off problems, and besides, she loved her wicked side. Rufus Meade’s words told her that he was easily provoked and had a short fuse, and she planned to light it; never would she forgo such a tantalizing challenge.

Curled up on her downy sofa, she wrote with relish: “Dear Mr. Meade, I’ve probably been unfair to you. You remind me so much of my grandfather, who was born just before the turn of the century. If you’re also a nonagenarian, my sincere apologies. For what it’s worth, I am not a ‘career woman.’ I am a woman who works at a job for which I am well trained. The alternative at present would be to marry a male chauvinist in exchange for my keep, or to take to the streets, since food, clothing, and shelter carry a price tag. But considering your concern for the fate of the family, I don’t think you’d approve of the latter. But then, it isn’t terribly different from the former, now, is it? Sorry, but I have to go; the Saturday afternoon Metropolitan Opera performance is just beginning, and I’m a sucker for La Traviata. Till next time. Naomi Logan.” After addressing it to him, she mailed it and hurried back to listen to the opera.

Several days later, engrossed in her work, Naomi laid aside her paintbrush and easel and reluctantly lifted the phone receiver. In a voice meant to discourage the caller, she muttered, “Yes?”

There was a brief silence, and then a deep male voice responded. “Miss Logan, please.”

She sat down, crossed her knee, and kicked off her right shoe. That voice could only belong to him. She had heard it only twice, but she would never forget it. It was a voice that commanded respect, that proclaimed its owner to be clever, authoritative, and manly, and, if you weren’t annoyed by its message, it was sensually beautiful.

“Speaking,” she said almost reluctantly, as if sensing the hand of fate. There was more silence. “I’m hanging up in thirty seconds,” she snapped. “Why are you calling?”

His reply was tinged with what struck her as a grudging laugh. “Miss Logan, this is Rufus Meade. It seems that your spoken language is as caustic as your letters.”

Her world suddenly brightened; she’d made him angry enough to call her. She tucked a little of her wild hair behind her ear and laughed. Many people had told her that her laughter sounded like bells clinking in the breeze. “I thought I had apologized for being disrespectful,” she said softly, with an affected sweetness. “If Grandpa knew how I’d behaved toward an older person, he’d raise the devil.”

“At the expense of being rude,” he replied tightly. “I doubt that there’s a ninety-year-old man on the face of this earth who is my equal, and if you’re less than eighty, I’m prepared to demonstrate it.”

Oh ho, she thought, and howled with laughter, hoping to infuriate him further. “My, my. Our ego’s been pricked, and we’ve got a short temper, too.”

“And less patience, madam. You’re brimming with self-confidence, aren’t you, Ms. Logan?” She assured him that she was. Up to then, his conversation had suggested to her that he didn’t hold her in high regard, so his next words surprised her.

“Taking a swipe at me in person should be much more gratifying than having to settle for snide remarks via the mail and over the phone, so why don’t you have lunch with me?”

She laughed again, turning the screw and enjoying it. “You couldn’t be serious. Why would you think I’d enjoy the company of a man who prefers bimbos to women who can spell? No, thank you.”

She sighed, concerned that she might have overdone it and realized that she had indeed when he replied in a deadly soft voice. “I hope you enjoy your own company, Ms. Logan. Sorry to have troubled you.”

He hung up before she could reply, and a sense of disappointment washed over her, a peculiar feeling that warmth she hadn’t realized she felt was suddenly lacking. It was strange and indefinable. She didn’t welcome close male friendship because she couldn’t afford them, and she had not been courting Rufus’s interest. She had just been having fun, she reasoned, and he wasn’t going to have the last word.

She got out her pen and paper and wrote: “Dear Rufus, how could one man have so many quirks? Bimbos, short temper, heavyweight ego, and heaven forbid, spoilsport. You need help, dear. Yours faithfully, Naomi.”

Naomi hadn’t heard from Rufus in three days, and she was glad; their conversation had left her with a sense of foreboding. She arrived home feeling exhausted from a two-hour argument with her fellow board members of One Last Chance that the foundation, which she had cofounded to aid girls with problems, would overstretch itself if it extended its facilities to boys. In the Washington, D.C., area, she had insisted, boys had the Police Athletic League for support, but for many girls, especially African American girls, there was only One Last Chance. And she knew its importance. How different her life might have been if the foundation had been there for her thirteen years ago, when she had been sixteen and forced to deal with the shattering aftermath of a misplaced trust.

She refreshed herself with a warm shower, dressed quickly in a dusty rose cowl-necked sweater and navy pants, and rushed to her best friend Marva’s wedding rehearsal. Dusty rose reminded her of the roses that her mother had so carefully tended and that still flourished around the house on Queens Chapel Terrace, where she had lived with her parents. She couldn’t recall those days well, but she thought she remembered her mother working in her garden on clear, sunny mornings during spring and summer. She regularly resisted the temptation to pass the house and look at the roses. She’d never seen any others that color, her favorite. It was why she had chosen a dress of that shade to wear as maid of honor at Marva’s wedding.

Marva was her closest friend, though in Naomi’s view they were exact opposites. The women’s one priority was the permanent attainment of an eligible man. Marriage wasn’t for her, but as maid of honor, she had to stand in for the bride—as close to the real thing as she would ever get. At times, she desperately longed for a man’s love and for children—lots of them. But she could not risk the disclosure that an intimate relationship with a man would ultimately require, and to make certain that she was never tempted, she kept men at a distance.

Naomi knew that men found her attractive, and she had learned how to put them off with empty, meaningless patter. It wasn’t that she didn’t like any of them; she did. She wanted to kick herself when the groom’s best man caught her scrutinizing him, a deeply bronzed six footer with a thin black mustache, good looks, and just the right amount of panache. She figured that her furtive glances had plumped his ego, because he immediately asked her out when the rehearsal was over. She deftly discouraged him, and it was becoming easier, she realized, when he backed off after just a tiny sample of her dazzling double-talk.

I’ll pay for it, she thought, as she mused over the evening during her drive home. Whenever she misrepresented herself as frivolous or callous to a man whom she could have liked, she became depressed afterward. Already she felt a bit down. But she walked into her apartment determined to dispel it. The day had been a long one that she wouldn’t soon forget. “Keep it light girl,” she reminded herself, as she changed her clothes. To make certain that she did, she put on a jazz cassette and brightened her mood, dancing until she was soaked with perspiration and too exhausted to move. Then she showered, donned her old clothes, and settled down to work.

She took pride in her work, designing logos, labels, and stationery for large corporations and other businesses, and she was happiest when she produced an elegant, imaginative design. Her considerable skill and novel approaches made her much sought after, and she earned a good living. She was glad that a new ice-cream manufacturer liked a logo that she’d produced, though the company wanted a cow in the middle of it. A cow! She stared at the paper and watched the paint drying on her brush, but not one idea emerged. Why couldn’t she dispel that strange something that welled up in her every time she thought of Rufus? It had been a week since her last provocative note to him, and she wondered whether he would answer. It was dangerous, she knew, to let her mind dwell on him, but his voice had a seductive, almost hypnotic effect on her. Where he was concerned, her mind did as it pleased. Tremors danced through her whenever she recalled his deep voice and lilting speech. Voices weren’t supposed to have that effect, she told herself. But his was a powerful drug. Was he young? Old? Short? She tried without success to banish him from her thoughts. While she hummed softly and struggled to fit the cow into the ice cream logo, an impatient ringing of her doorbell and then a knock on the door startled her. Why hadn’t the doorman announced the visitor, she wondered, as she peeped through the viewer and saw a man there.

“May I help you?” She couldn’t see all of him. Tall, she guessed.

“I hope so. I’m looking for Naomi Logan.” Her first reaction was a silent, “My God it’s him!” Her palms suddenly became damp, and tiny shivers of anticipation rushed through her. She would never forget that voice. But she refused him the satisfaction of knowing that she remembered it. She’d written him on her personal stationery, but he’d sent his letter to her through the station; she didn’t have a clue as to where he lived. She struggled to calm herself.

“Who is it, please?” Could that steady voice be hers?

“I’m Rufus Meade, and I’d like to see Miss Logan, if I may.”

“I ought to leave him standing there,” she grumbled to herself, but she knew that neither her sense of decency nor her curiosity would allow her to do it, and she opened the door.

Rufus Meade stood in the doorway staring at the woman who had vexed him beyond reason. She wasn’t at all what he had expected. Around twenty-nine, he surmised, and by any measure, beautiful. Tall and slim, but deliciously curved. He let his gaze feast on her smooth dark skin, eyes the color of dark walnut, and long, thick curly black tresses that seemed to fly all over the place. God, he hadn’t counted on this. Something just short of a full-blown desire burned in the pit of his belly. He recognized it as more than a simple craving for her; he wanted to know her totally, completely, and in every intimate way possible.

Naomi borrowed from her years of practice at shoving her emotions aside and pulled herself together first. If there was such a thing as an eviscerating, brain-damaging clap of thunder, she had just experienced it. Grasping the doorknob for support, she shifted her glance from his intense gaze, took in the rest of him, and then risked looking back into those strangely unsettling fawnlike eyes. And she had thought his voice a narcotic. Add that to the rest of him and…Lord! He was lethal! If she had any sense, she’d slam the door shut.

“You’re Rufus Meade?” she asked. Trying unsuccessfully to appear calm, she knitted her brow and worried her bottom lip. She could see that he was uncomfortable, even slightly awed, as if he, too, was having a new and not particularly agreeable experience. But he shrugged his left shoulder, winked at her, and took control of the situation.

“Yes, I’m Rufus Meade, and don’t tell me you’re Naomi Logan.”

She laughed, forgetting her paint-smeared jeans and T-shirt and her bare feet. “Since you don’t look anywhere near ninety, I want to see some identification.” He pulled out his driver’s license and handed it to her, nodding in approval as he did so.

“I see you’re a fast thinker. Can’t be too careful these days.”

Unable to resist needling him, she gave him her sweetest smile. “Do you think a bimbo would have thought to do that?” It was the kind of repartee that she used as a screen to hide her interest in a man or to dampen his, like crossing water to throw an animal off one’s trail.

His silence gave her a very uneasy feeling. What if he was dangerous? She didn’t know a thing about him. She tried to view him with the crust caused by his physical attractiveness removed from her eyes. Clearly he was a most unlikely candidate for ridicule; nothing about him suggested it. A strapping, virile male of about thirty-four, he was good-looking, with smooth dark skin and large fawnlike eyes, a lean face, clean shaven and apparently well mannered. She backed up a step. The man took up a lot of psychological space and had an aura of steely strength. He was also at least six feet four, and he wore clothes like a model. So much for that, she concluded silently; all I learned is that I like what I see.

His demeanor was that of a self-possessed man. Why, then, did he behave as if he wanted to eat nails? She was tempted to ask him, but she doubted his mood would tolerate the impertinence. He leaned against her door, hands in his pockets, and swept his gaze over her.

“Miss Logan, your tongue is tart enough to make a saint turn in his halo. Are you going to ask me in, or are you partial to nonagenarians?”

There was something to be said for his ability to toss out a sally, she decided, stepping back and grinning. “Touché. Come on in.” She noticed that he walked in slowly, as if it wouldn’t have surprised him to find a booby trap of some kind, and quickly summed up his surroundings. After casually scanning the elegant but sparsely furnished foyer and the intensely personal living room, he glanced at her. “Some of your choices surprise me, Naomi.” He pointed to a reproduction of a Remington sculpture. “That would represent masculine taste.”

“I bought it because that man is free, because he looks as if he just burst out of a place he hadn’t wanted to be.” He quirked his left eyebrow and didn’t comment, but she could see he had more questions.

“The Elizabeth Catlett sculpture,” she explained, when his glance rested on it, “was the first sculpture that I had even seen by an African American woman; I bought it with my first paycheck. I don’t know how familiar you are with art, but along with music, it’s what I like best. These are also the works of African Americans. That painting,” she pointed to an oil by the art historian James Porter, “was given to me by me grandpa for my college graduation. And the reproduction of the painting by William H. Johnson is…well, the little girl reminded me of myself at that age.”

Rufus observed the work closely, as if trying to determine whether there was anything in that painting of a wide-eyed little black girl alone with a fly swatter and a doll carriage that would tell him exactly who Naomi Logan was.

While he scrutinized the Artis Lane lithograph portrait of Rosa Parks that both painter and subject had signed, Naomi let her gaze roam brazenly over him. What on earth is wrong with me, she asked herself when she realized, after scanning his long, powerful legs, that her imagination was moving into forbidden territory. She had never ogled a man, never been tempted. Not until now. She disciplined her thoughts and tried to focus on his questions. Her heartbeat accelerated as if she’d run for miles when he moved to the opposite end of the room, paused before a group of original oils, turned to her, and smiled. It softened his face and lit up his remarkable eyes. She knew that she gaped. What in heaven’s name was happening to her?

“So you’re an artist? Somehow, I pictured you as a disciplinarian of some sort.” He stared intently at the painting of her mother entitled “From My Memories” and turned to look at her.

“Isn’t this a self-portrait? I don’t have any technical knowledge of art, but I have a feeling that this is good.” She opened her mouth to speak until she saw him casually raising his left hand to the back of his head, exposing the tiny black curls at his wrist. She stared at it; it was just a hand, for God’s sake. Embarrassed, she quickly steadied herself and managed to respond to his compliment.

“No. That’s the way I remember my mother. Have a seat while I get us some coffee. Or would you prefer juice, or a soft drink?” She had to put some distance between them, and separate rooms was the best she could do.

He didn’t sit. “Coffee’s fine,” he told her, trailing her into the kitchen. She turned and bumped into him, and excitement coursed through her when he quickly settled her with a slight touch on her arm. Her skin felt hot where his finger had been, and she knew that he could see a fine sheen of perspiration on her face. Reluctantly, she looked up, saw the tough man in him searing her with his hot, mesmerizing eyes, and felt her heart skid out of place. He made her feel things that she hadn’t known could be felt, and all of a sudden, she wanted him out of there. The entire apartment seemed too small with him in it, making her much too aware of him. The letters had been fun, and she had enjoyed joshing with him over the phone, but he had a powerful personality and an intimidating physique. At her height, she wasn’t accustomed to being made to feel small and helpless. And she had never experienced such a powerful sexual pull toward a man. But, she noticed, he seemed to have his emotions under lock and key.

He leaned over her drawing board seemingly to get a better view of the sketches there. “Are you a commercial artist, or do you teach art somewhere?”

“I’m a commercial artist if by that you mean work on contract.”

Rufus looked at her quizzically. “Did you want to be some other kind of artist?”

Naomi took the coffee and started toward the living room. She had a few questions of her own, and one of them had to do with why he was here. “I wanted to be an artist. Period.” She passed him a cup of coffee, cream, and sugar. He accepted only the coffee.

“Why did you come here, Rufus?” If he was uncomfortable, only he knew it. He rested his left ankle on his right knee, took a few sips of coffee, and placed the cup and saucer on the table beside his chair. His grin disconcerted her; it didn’t seem to reach his eyes.

It wasn’t a hostile question, but she hadn’t meant it as friendly, either. She watched as he assessed her coolly. “You certainly couldn’t have put it more bluntly if you tried. Whatever happened to that gnawing wit of yours? I came here on impulse. That last hot little note of yours made me so mad that neither a letter nor a phone call would do. You made me furious, Naomi, and if I think about it much, I’ll get angry all over again.” She leaned back in the thickly cushioned chair, thinking absently that he had an oversupply of charisma, when his handsome brown face suddenly shifted into a fierce scowl.

She wasn’t impressed. “What cooled you off?”

He shrugged first one shoulder, then the other one. “You are so damned irreverent that you made the whole thing seem foolish. One look at you, standing there ready to take me on, demanding to see my ID with your door already wide open—well, my reaction was that I was being a jackass when I let you pull my leg. You’ve been having fun at my expense.”

It didn’t seem wise to laugh. “It was your fault.”

He stiffened. “How do you figure that any of this is my fault, lady?” This time, she couldn’t restrain the laughter.

“Temper, temper. If you didn’t have such a short fuse and if you talked about things you know, especially on a radio broadcast, none of this would have happened.”

He stood. “I’m leaving. Never in my life have I lost my temper with a woman, or even approached it, and I’m not going to allow you to provoke me into making an exception with you. You’re the most exasperating…”

Her full-throated laughter, like tiny tinkling temple bells, halted his attack. He gave her a long, heated stare.

She shivered, disconcerted by his compelling gaze. With that fleeting desire-laden look, he kindled something within her, something that had fought to surface since she’d opened her door. She walked with him to her foyer, where indirect lights cast a pale, ethereal glow over them, and stood with her hand on the doorknob. She knew he realized she was deliberately prolonging his departure, and she was a little ashamed, but she didn’t open the door. It was unfathomable. A minute earlier, she had wanted him to leave; now, she was hindering his departure. Less certain of herself than she had been earlier, she fished for words that would give her a feeling of ease. “I meant to ask how you became an expert on the family, but, well, maybe another time.”

Rufus lifted an eyebrow in surprise. He hadn’t thought she’d be interested in seeing him again. Despite himself, he couldn’t resist a slow and thorough perusal of her. He wanted to…no. He wasn’t that crazy. Her unexpected feminine softness, the dancing mischief in her big brown eyes, and the glow on her bare lips were not going to seduce him into putting his mouth on her. He stepped back, remembering her question.

“I’m a journalist, and I’ve recently had a book published that deals with delinquent behavior and the family’s role in it. You may have heard of it: Keys to Delinquent Behavior in the Nineties.”

“Of course I know it; that book’s been a bestseller for months. I hadn’t noticed the author’s name and didn’t associate it with you. I haven’t read it, but I may.” She offered her hand. “I’m glad to have met you, Rufus; it’s been interesting.”

He drew himself up to his full height and pretended not to see her hand. He wasn’t used to getting the brush-off and wasn’t going to be the victim of one tonight. He jammed his hands in his pockets and assumed a casual stance.

“You make it seem so…so final.” He hated his undisciplined reaction to her. Her warm, seductive voice, her sepia beauty, and her light, airy laughter made his spine tingle. He had really summoned her up incorrectly. She was far from the graying, disillusioned spinster that he had pictured. He wanted to see what she looked like; well, he had seen, and he had better move on.

“Couldn’t we have dinner some evening?” He smiled inwardly; so much for his advice to himself.

He could see that she was immediately on guard. “I’m sorry, but my evenings are pretty much taken up.” She tucked thick, curly hair behind her left ear. “Perhaps we’ll run into each other. Goodbye.”

He wasn’t easily fooled, but he could be this time, he cautioned himself, and looked at her for a long while, testing her sincerity and attempting to gauge the extent of his attraction to her. Chemistry so strong as what he felt wasn’t usually one-sided; he’d thought at first that she reciprocated it, but now, neither her face nor her posture told him anything. She’s either a consummate actress or definitely not interested in me, he decided as he turned the doorknob. “Goodbye, Naomi.” He strode out the door and down the corridor without a backward glance.

Naomi watched him until he entered the elevator, a man in complete control, and hugged herself, fighting the unreasonable feeling that he had deserted her, chilled her with his leaving; that he had let his warmth steal into her and then, miser-like, withdrawn it, leaving her cold. What on earth have I done to myself, she wondered plaintively.

Rufus drove home slowly, puzzled at what had just transpired. Everything about Naomi jolted him. He didn’t mislead himself; he knew that his cool departure from her apartment belied his unsettled emotions. What had he thought she would be like? Older, certainly, but definitely not a barefoot, paint-spattered witch. She’d had a strong impact on him, and he didn’t like it. He had his life in order, and he was not going to permit this wild attraction to disturb it. She had everything that made a woman interesting, starting with a mind that would keep a man alert and his brain humming. Honorable, too. And, Lord, she was luscious! Tempting. A real, honest-to-God black beauty.

He entered his house through the garage door that opened into the kitchen and made his way upstairs. All was quiet, so he undressed, sprawled out in the king-sized bed that easily accommodated his six feet four and a half inches, and faced the fact that he wanted Naomi. It occurred to him from her total disregard for his celebrity status that Naomi didn’t know who he was. She found him attractive for himself and not for his bank account, as Etta Mae and so many others had, and it was refreshing. If she didn’t want to acknowledge the attraction, fine with him; neither did he. If there were only himself to consider, he reasoned, he would probably pursue a relationship with Naomi, though definitely not for the long term. It had been his personal experience that the children of career women didn’t get their share of maternal attention. That meant that he could not and would not have one in his life.