Читать книгу The Husband Contract - Kathleen O'Brien - Страница 7

“OH, BLAST all!” Melanie balefully eyed the charred bread sticks on the pan in front of her. “Just look at this,” she said, raising her voice so that it could be heard in the adjacent living room. “I burned them. Damn that man!”

Ted Martin, who was spread out comfortably on her sofa watching a basketball game on television, lifted his blond head. “Who?”

“Clay Logan, of course. Who else?” She picked up one of the blackened twists, which was the consistency of a hockey stick, and knocked it against the counter.

It felt perversely gratifying to hit something. Today had been a very, very bad day. Only forty-eight hours after receiving a copy of Joshua Browning’s will, Melanie’s lawyer had called this afternoon with the tragic news. However medieval it might seem, the will appeared to be ironclad. Clay Logan was too good to have left any loopholes.

Her lawyer had been sympathetic, but the bottom line was that he just couldn’t agree to take the case on a contingency basis—the odds of winning were too slim. His best advice, he said, was that she should negotiate with Logan, who was by all accounts a tough lawyer but a fair and just human being.

Well, not by all accounts. If anyone had asked her, the report would have been a great deal less flattering. She wasn’t ready to agree he was a human being at all.

She whacked the bread stick one last time. “Damn, damn, damn the man. May his grandchildren be cross-eyed. May all his dogs have fleas.”

With a resigned sigh, Ted sat up and turned off the television. “Why? Logan didn’t make you burn the bread, did he?”

She came to the doorway, scowling. “Of course he did.”

“How?” Ted ambled into the kitchen and extracted a fat strawberry from the pie on the windowsill. “Did he break in and sabotage the oven thermostat?”

“He might as well have.” Melanie pulled the strawberry from his fingers just an inch short of his lips. “Honestly, Ted, you’re as bad as Nick.” She tucked the berry back into its cradle of whipped cream. “Now, where was I? Oh, yes—I curse Clay Logan and all his dogs because he’s an insufferable man, and I hate him. I’m so busy hating him, in fact, that I’ve ruined a perfectly good dinner.”

“No, you didn’t. The spaghetti’s fine. And I made one hell of a salad. Let’s eat.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I can’t. I hate Logan too much to eat.”

“Good. More for me.” Ted reached around her to rummage for utensils. “But seriously, are you sure it’s Logan you’re mad at, Mel? He was just the hired gun, wasn’t he? The will itself is your problem—and that was your uncle’s idea.”

“Yeah, I suppose so.” She knew Ted was right, but her annoyance was no less intense for being irrational. She could still see how Logan had looked at the chess match the other day, sizing her up, obviously deciding that Joshua had been right. “But I wish you could have seen his face when he told me. He was the hired gun all right, and he thoroughly enjoyed pulling the trigger.”

“Well, that dirty rat!” Ted’s attempt at a gangster accent failed miserably. “I’ll stab him in the alley like the dog he is.” He tossed silverware nosily. “Or I would if I could find a damn knife.”

Melanie patted his forearm affectionately. Good old Ted—she thanked heaven for his support this past year. It had been a tough year for both of them. Ted’s fiancée had left him last summer, a break that had wounded him more deeply than he liked to acknowledge. And at about the same time, Melanie’s life had been turned upside down by the arrival of her little brother, who had decided he could no longer tolerate living with his domineering Uncle Joshua.

Melanie herself had escaped Uncle Joshua’s tyranny years ago, running away when she was only sixteen, but Nick had stayed with the old man until last year, when their relationship finally grew so stormy that the boy had sought sanctuary with Melanie.

As the dean of boys at Wakefield, Ted had heard about Nick’s change of address immediately and phoned Melanie for a conference. Since then, Ted had become her best friend. She’d rested her woes on his shoulders a hundred times.

And nice shoulders they were, too—trim and solid and warm. She wondered, not for the first time, why their relationship had never blossomed into a romance. Perhaps Ted wasn’t over Sheila yet—Melanie suspected he might never forget his former fiancée. But Melanie didn’t mind. In spite of Ted’s many charms, she had never felt anything more than friendship toward him. No leap of flame. Not even a tiny wriggle of heat.

The sad truth was, she’d felt more sexual awareness watching Clay Logan launder his shirt with his lips today than she ever had here in Ted Martin’s arms.

Yes, life was just a charming little bundle of ironies, wasn’t it?

Still, his big brother comfort was just what she needed now, when her heart was so sore. Who would have guessed she would find her uncle’s death so unnerving? Was it possible she had been harboring hopes of an eventual reconciliation?

Surely not. She might be naive, immature, impractical—all the things Joshua had accused her of—but she wasn’t a complete idiot. She’d given up yearning for his love years ago. Now she merely wanted justice.

Still—suddenly she couldn’t bear the memories of her uncle. Joshua, bent over his dusty old maps. Joshua, barking into his cellular telephone. Joshua studying the financial pages. Joshua, completely ignoring the little girl waiting in the doorway.

She caught her breath, stunned by the wave of sorrow that overwhelmed her. Instantly aware, Ted dropped the flatware and wrapped his arms around her gently.

“It’s okay,” he said, his voice low and steady. “It’s going to be okay.”

“I know.” She shut her eyes. Ted was right. Everything would work out, love or no love, money or no money. Somehow she and Nick would get through.

“Oh, man, that is so gross.”

Straightening, she looked up to see Nick squatting by the open door of the refrigerator, scrounging irritably through the bowls and bottles.

“What’s gross?” With a smile, she patted Ted’s cheek, extricated herself and hurried to her brother’s side. She peered in at the shelves. “Has something spoiled?”

Nick grimaced and grabbed a cold leg of fried chicken. “Yeah, my appetite,” he said. He stood up, gnawing on the drumstick. “People can see you two through the window, you know. Can’t you save that crap for when I’m gone?”

Melanie slowly closed the refrigerator door before speaking. She hardly knew which transgression to address first “Don’t use that word, Nick,” she began.

But he merely grunted and turned his back to her. He had the remote control in his hand and he flicked on the television.

“And what do you mean, when you’re gone?” she asked, keeping her voice neutral. “Were you planning to go out? It’s a school night, you know. It’s Tuesday.”

“Wow.” Nick didn’t turn around. “News flash. It’s Tuesday.”

Behind her, Melanie felt Ted’s tension snap. She touched his arm, warning him, but it was too late. “Listen, Nick,” he said in the tone he ordinarily reserved for the Wakefield campus, “that’s no way to treat—”

Nick finally looked around. His face was hard, closed in. “Hey, we’re not at school now, okay?” He tossed the stripped chicken bone toward the trash can. It missed by two inches, landing with a disagreeable splat on the linoleum. “You’re not the dean when you’re here, man.”

“Nick! Apologize to Mr. Martin immediately,” Melanie ordered, but her words were almost lost beneath a sudden barrage of honking. Five short, aggressive, obviously impatient blares reverberated into the living room.

The sounds acted on Nick like a starting pistol on a sprinter.

He yanked his grimy baseball cap from the kitchen table and darted for the door.

“Nick.” Melanie’s voice was unyielding.

The boy paused. She could almost see him working to swallow his pride.

Finally he turned to Ted. “Sorry, Mr. Martin,” he said, dragging every syllable out with effort. “I guess I lost my cool there. I really didn’t mean to be so rude.”

Ted still looked ruffled, but he accepted the apology fairly graciously. Melanie breathed a sigh of relief. One more crisis averted. Life with a teenager was like this—all peaks and valleys. Poor Nick seemed to be strapped to a hormonal tiger—and Melanie was whipping along behind, holding the bucking tail, trying to hang on.

“Sorry I was being a pig, Mel,” he said, turning to his sister with an expression so angelic she almost laughed out loud. Who did he think he was kidding? “Figgy and I were going out for a burger. His brother Bash is driving. We’ll be back by nine. Okay?”

“Oh, don’t give me that sad-puppy look, you scamp,” she said, reaching out to touch his dark chestnut hair, so wild and messy, yet so like her own. It was hard to stay angry with Nick. Perhaps it was because she remembered all too well her own defiance at fifteen. Or maybe it was because she and Nick had no one but each other now. “I guess it’s okay,” she said, “assuming you’ve done all your home—”

But Nick didn’t dawdle an instant beyond the “okay.” He was already bolting across the front yard, leaping the small iron gate and racing toward the waiting car.

Melanie followed him out, and even after the roaring muffler faded to silence, she lingered on the porch. In a few seconds, she heard Ted’s footsteps. She tossed him an apologetic smile over her shoulder. “Sorry he was such a creep,” she said. “Must have been a spike in the hormone current.”

Ted chuckled. “If only they’d hurry up and invent a cure for adolescence.”

She sighed her heartfelt agreement, but she didn’t pursue the subject. Nick was gone, taking his raging hormones with him, and she didn’t feel like worrying anymore tonight. Instead she breathed deeply, savoring the peace of the sweet latespring evening. Crickets scratched, maples rustled, and in the distance a dog proclaimed himself lord of all he surveyed.

Wrapping her hand around the front post, Melanie gazed down the narrow street, studying the small, cinder-block houses. In spite of a few questionable neighbors, occasional raucous late-night fights in the house next door, she liked this cozy, unpretentious neighborhood, spotty grass, barking dogs and all. She’d take it over the sterile grandeur of Cartouche Court, Joshua’s personal monument to vulgarity, any day.

“Nick hates it here,” she said suddenly. Ted stirred, but he didn’t jump in with a response. She liked that about Ted. He was a good listener. “Every day when we get in the car to go home, he starts singing. Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s home to the ghetto we go.” Though technically it wasn’t funny, she had to smile, remembering. “It’s too awful. He does it in this simply spine-tingling falsetto.”

“Jeez. That brat really needs a boot in the rear, doesn’t he?”

She shook her head helplessly, still grinning. “I guess he just lived too long with my uncle. Cartouche Court can kind of distort your perspective.”

Ted hesitated a moment, and when he spoke, his tone was only half-teasing. “All right, out with it, Mel. Is this your way of telling me you’re going to go after the inheritance after all? What are you going to do—wed some pillar of the community just so you can restore Nick to the elegance of the Court?”

She tilted a glance up into his kind, intelligent face. Darn. He read her too well. She hadn’t even been sure herself, until just moments ago, what she was going to do.

“A ‘pillar of the community’? Ugh. Sounds like the statue in the town square.” She shivered. “No. I’d never go that far, even for Nick. But surely there’s a way to get our inheritance without resorting to marriage.”

“Oh, yeah? How?”

She hoisted herself up on the porch railing, settling her flowered skirt primly around her knees. “Well…” She drew the syllable out, stalling. “Perhaps I can persuade this executioner—”

“Executor.”

“Whatever.” She folded her hands in her lap. “Persuade this Logan fellow that I’m not quite the hopeless flake Joshua said I was.” She smiled. “I mean, I do pay my bills, keep a clean house and floss twice a day. I haven’t shot anyone lately, and I don’t think anybody knows about that time I doubleparked outside the Saveway.”

Ted’s brown gaze remained skeptical. “Yeah, it sounds easy. But the one thing you’re not factoring in is your—”

“My pride?” She raised her chin. “I may be a bit…independent, but believe it or not, I can humble myself. Occasionally, anyhow.” She bit her lip. “Temporarily.”

“Actually it’s not your pride I’m worried about. It’s…well, to put it frankly, your temper.” He lifted a finger to silence her indignant protest “Come on, you know it would make you crazy to let Logan paw through your receipts, deciding whether you paid too much for spaghetti sauce or underwear. You’re just not the type of woman who submits to nonsense like this.”

She scowled. His speech had the irritating ring of truth. “You could be wrong, you know,” she said haughtily. “You’re the dean of boys, not the Freud of females.”

“Yeah, I could be wrong. But I’m not” He tugged on her ponytail, grinning. “I don’t know exactly what would make you surrender yourself to Clay Logan’s authority—or any other man’s for that matter—but I know what won’t. Twelve million dollars won’t”

But five hours later, when the police called to tell her that Figgy, Bash and Nick were down at the police station, she discovered that Ted was wrong.

Twelve million dollars would.

The weather was gloomy all that Saturday morning. It never quite rained, but the sky was bad-tempered, growling and spitting irritably from the time Melanie woke up until the moment she parked her tiny sedan in the circular driveway of Cartouche Court.

She sat for a moment after turning off the ignition, listening to the crackles and snaps of the old engine as it settled. The noises got weirder every day. Hooking her hands over the steering wheel, she peered up at the mansion. She hadn’t been here in years, but the place looked depressingly the same. Big and boxy, ugly and unwelcoming. She felt a sudden urge to start the engine and go home.

Why was she being such a wimp? She wasn’t an eight-yearold orphan anymore. Climbing out of the car, she adjusted her calf-length navy blue skirt, did a quick button check, then used a forefinger to chase any stray lipstick back within the lines. Everything was where it belonged, she decided—except her heart, which was exhibiting a regrettable tendency to beat rather high in her throat.

She slowly ascended the marble front steps and rang the bell. While she waited, she studied the pseudo-Grecian statues that flanked the double front doors. She’d always found them disturbing—two naked, armless females who appeared to have been frozen midflight as they tned to escape the house. Probably Uncle Joshua’s definition of the perfect woman, Melanie thought. Mute, helpless and hopelessly trapped.

“Morning, ladies,” she said, patting the truncated shoulder of the nearest statue. “I’m back, you see. I thought I had gotten away, but apparently it’s not that easy.” She wrinkled her nose. “I guess I don’t have to tell you about that.”

Suddenly the front door swung open, and Melanie’s mouth went embarrassingly slack. For a minute, it was as if the past sixteen years had never even existed. In spite of her grownup clothes, in spite of the lipstick and the car keys, Melanie was eight years old again, staring up into the sourest face she had ever seen.

“Mrs. Hilliard.” Her voice even sounded like a child’s. She cleared her throat, swallowed, then tried again. “It’s good to see you, Mrs. Hilliard. How have you been?”

The woman’s long, square jaw tightened, and her black eyes, surrounded by dark smudges below and thick, slashing black brows above, narrowed. “I’ve been missing your uncle, that’s how I’ve been,” Mrs. Hilliard said flatly. “I don’t suppose you can say the same.”

If her life had been a children’s book, Melanie thought, like The Secret Garden or Pollyanna, Joshua’s housekeeper would have been rosy cheeked and cheerful, always ready to comfort the new little orphan with a hug, or a licorice twist, or a bracing bit of country wisdom. Instead, she had been like this. Cold, critical and painfully candid.

Melanie’s instincts told her she’d better establish new ground rules. She clamped her jaw shut, straightened to her full five-four and met the woman’s gaze straight on. “I believe Mr. Logan is expecting me, Mrs. Hilliard,” she said firmly, ignoring the woman’s question. And why shouldn’t she? It was a rude and nosy question.

The housekeeper blinked twice, then stood back, holding the door wide. “He’s in the library,” she said, her tone falling short of courtesy, but, at least for the moment, smothering the open hostility. After all, there was the off chance that Melanie might be able to claim her inheritance. Melanie hadn’t ever contended that Mrs. Hilliard was stupid. Just mean.

The housekeeper left her to find her own way to the library, which was at the extreme end of the entry hall—a hall that by itself was almost as big as her whole house in Sewage Basin Heights.

But something was different today…. She looked toward the curving central staircase and finally realized that two workmen were kneeling on the steps, pulling up the carpet. They talked softly in some melodic foreign language, and one of them even whistled while he worked. Their chatter paused as she passed, and they smiled at her.

She smiled back, grateful for the sense of life and energy that their presence lent to the house, which was usually as silent as a crypt. During Uncle Joshua’s reign, workmen never whistled.

Oh, how painfully vivid the memories were—how miserable she had been here! She felt her resolve hardening and quickened her steps. She deserved this inheritance, by God. Joshua owed her something for all those lonely years.

When she finally reached it, the dark-paneled library door was tightly shut, just as it had always been in her uncle’s day. She considered barging in, but old habits died hard. So she knocked, but she knocked briskly, determined to arrive with confidence.

“Damn, damn, damn! Who the hell is that?”

They were her uncle’s words. Joshua always cursed whenever the phone rang or a knock sounded at the door. Antisocial by nature and by habit, he always assumed that any contact from the outside world would be a nuisance.

Melanie put out one hand to steady herself on the paneling, but then she remembered. Not her uncle, of course not It must be Copernicus. How could she have forgotten Copernicus? Her uncle’s parrot, a bird as ill-tempered as its owner, had been uncannily precocious about picking up swearwords. His talents had delighted Joshua, who had taught him to be profane in six languages.

“Who is it? Who the hell is it?” The parrot was still posing the question querulously when Clay Logan opened the heavy door. The library within was dim. Though its domed ceiling rose to a huge skylight in the center, on a rainy day nothing but gloom came through. All that mahogany paneling was positively funereal—so it took her a moment to realize he was holding a magnifying glass in one hand and a map in the other.

He waved her in with the map hand. “Melanie. Come in. I’m just finishing up here, but for God’s sake, come show yourself to Copernicus before he has a stroke.”

“He won’t have a stroke,” she assured him, her tone slightly acid. “He thrives on irascibility. Just like my uncle.”

But she walked over to the old parrot anyway and presented herself in front of his perch. She had been sixteen the last time she saw Copernicus. The bird was silent as if he’d recognized her but couldn’t believe his eyes. He shifted from foot to foot and bobbed nervously, watching her through first one eye and then the other.

“Good Lord, he’s speechless.” Clay had retreated to the big carved desk in the middle of the room, but he’d looked up from the map he’d been studying and was observing their interplay curiously. “That’s a first”

“Oh, he’ll recover. He’ll be swearing at me in Portuguese pretty soon.”

Clay chuckled and went back to his perusal of the map before him. Looking at him, Melanie felt a strange confusion in the pit of her stomach. He had explained that he was staying at Cartouche Court for a while, appraising her uncle’s antique map collection, but somehow actually seeing him behind that desk was a shock. Joshua had spent so many hours there, bent over those same maps.

And yet Clay couldn’t have looked less like her uncle. Joshua’s interest in the collection had been dry, brittle, precise. The only emotion they evoked in him was greed.

In contrast, Clay seemed to be all vibrant masculinity even in repose. With his shirtsleeves rolled back to his elbows and his aristocratic profile bent over the mottled paper, he seemed excited by the map, more like an explorer than an academic. A ship’s captain, perhaps, or a warring king studying the charts that would lead him to some new, exotic adventure, some thrilling conquest.

Melanie mentally shook herself. What nonsensical fancy was this? Clay Logan might have walked into her life as a black knight, but he was just an ordinary man, nothing more, nothing less. The fact that her uncle had given him so much power over her future was making her imagine things.

Striving for a more natural air, she strolled toward the desk and stole a peek over his shoulder. The map was very old, its colorful pictures quite strange and beautiful. Ships and sea monsters lurked in the oceans; heraldic emblems decorated the borders, while in each corner a face with puffed cheeks blew the four winds toward the land.

“It’s fourteenth century,” Clay said. He ran a long forefinger across the youthful, garlanded head of Zephyrus, the west wind. “Hand colored. Beautiful, but not terribly accurate. I would have hated to try to use it to actually get anywhere.”

She looked again. “Well, at least it warns you where not to go. It shows quite clearly where the monsters are.”

“True.” Leaning back, Clay gazed up at her thoughtfully. “The only problem is that they were wrong. The most terrifying monster on this map swims in what’s now the best fishing water around the Bahamas.” He smiled. “Like many people, mapmakers created monsters out of their own ignorance. Out of their own fears.”

His smile seemed slightly wry. Did that comment carry a double meaning? Was he suggesting that she had demonized Uncle Joshua out of her own insecurity? Watchful of her temper, she chose not to address that issue.

“I can sympathize with that,” she said. She hoped she sounded confident, only slightly self-effacing. “I certainly let my fears get away from me when you came to Wakefield the other day. I want to apologize for flying off the handle like that.”

He was still smiling. “No apology is necessary. I expected you to find the terms of Joshua’s will disagreeable. I wasn’t at all surprised that you decided I was one of your monsters. How are you feeling now? Has your attorney had time to look over the will?”

“Yes,” she said uncomfortably. He must know what her lawyer had said. If she still cherished any hopes of getting the will thrown out, she would never have come here. “He tells me that my uncle’s will is quite legal and probably unbreakable.”

“He must be an unusually ethical man, then,” Clay said, sounding surprised. “A lot of lawyers would assure you it was worth a try, just so they could bill you for hundreds of hours of ‘trying’.”

She bit her lower lip, wondering how honest she needed to be. Completely honest, she decided unhappily. A woman mature enough to inherit twelve million dollars didn’t shrink from confronting an embarrassing fact or two.

“Well, he didn’t really have any incentive to mislead me. I asked him to take the case on a contingency basis. He wouldn’t have earned a cent if he hadn’t overturned the will.” She lifted her chin. “I can’t afford to contest this will frivolously, Mr. Logan.”

“Then don’t contest it at all,” he said softly. “Your uncle wanted a will that would stand up to any challenge, and that’s what I gave him.” Standing, he came around the side of the desk. “Look, Melanie, I’ve got an idea.”

His smile was warm and utterly charming, which made her instantly suspicious. Warm, charming people didn’t ordinarily work well—or very long—with Joshua Browning.

“Since you’ve acknowledged that I’m not technically a monster,” he said, his tone teasing. “why don’t we start over? We’ll sit down, you’ll agree to call me Clay, and we’ll talk this whole thing over calmly.”

She nodded slowly, banishing the suspicion. This was, after all, what she had hoped would happen. Calm. Cooperative. That wasn’t so hard. She could do that

“Good. How about over here, then?” Clay gestured to a large leather sofa directly under the skylight, the most cheerful spot in a room like this. Its only drawback was that it faced a small, strange display of antique handcuffs and thumbscrews that Joshua had collected over the years. More obsession with power.

But rather than quibble with Clay’s choice of seats—that was no way to start a cooperative chat—Melanie sat, settling herself at an angle to the display. If she didn’t turn her head much, she couldn’t even see the nasty little items.

When she leaned back, though, the sofa suddenly hissed and writhed beneath her. She leaped to her feet, startled beyond speech. A very large reddish-brown cat—so like the color of the sofa that she hadn’t even seen it—was huffily rearranging himself, angry at the disruption but too lazy to get out of the way.

Clay laughed and, reaching over, dumped the fat, furry feline unceremoniously onto the floor. “Get lost, Fudge. You’re in the way.”

“Damn cat,” the parrot complained from his perch. “Useless beast.”

Melanie stared from Copernicus to the cat, then turned her bewildered gaze to Clay. She finally found her voice. “Is that yours?”

Clay shook his head, patting the now-empty spot, encouraging her to take her seat again. “Good Lord, no. That lazy feline belonged to your uncle.”

“Joshua had a cat?” Melanie tried to picture it. For years, she and Nick had begged their uncle for a pet, but he’d always refused. Too much hair, too much trouble. And now—this? “My uncle hated cats. He never had a cat in his life.”

“I gave this one to him a year ago,” Clay said mildly.

“Fudge shared tuna sandwiches with him, ate them right off his plate.” He eyed her speculatively. “You’ve been gone a long time, you know. A lot can change in eight years.”

“Obviously.” She sank onto the sofa, a little dizzy suddenly, slightly disoriented. She felt like the blindfolded player in that old children’s game, twirled first this way and that until she had no idea which way she was facing.

It had been a mistake to come here. She should have waited until Monday, when she could have met Clay in his office. This place had too many memories, too much emotional residue. Right now, her thoughts were so off balanced that she wondered if she could even find the words to state her case.

“I think I’d better just come straight to the point,” she said, her voice hardly as steady as it should be. “Nick is at a ball game with a friend, but they’ll be back soon.”

“Okay,” he said, settling comfortably against the sofa.

“I’m listening.”

“Okay,” she echoed. Her voice sounded hollow in her ears.

“As you may have guessed, I want to talk to you about Joshua’s will. I…well, I wanted you to know that, in spite of what my uncle may have told you about me, I really am not a crazy teenager anymore. I’m twenty-four. I work. I live a perfectly sensible, even frugal…”

She hesitated. His gaze was curious, polite, but somehow unnerving. This was going to be much harder than she had anticipated. And perhaps, though these were the words she’d practiced in front of the mirror, she was going at it all wrong. Even she could hear that she still sounded angry, defensive.

She started over. “I want my inheritance, Clay. I believe I deserve it, and I’m willing to do whatever is necessary to convince you of that. Anything you need—credit reports, bank accounts, work references—I’m prepared to make it all available to you.”

He raised his brows. “This is a fairly dramatic turnaround, isn’t it? May I ask what happened to change your mind so completely?”

She flushed. “I’ve already admitted I overreacted. I’ve given this a lot of thought since that afternoon. In fact, I’ve thought of almost nothing else. I’ve realized that I have nothing to hide, nothing to fear from an inspection of my finances or my lifestyle.” She tried to smile. “You just reminded me that a lot can change in eight years. You’re right. Perhaps my uncle changed—I don’t know. But I do know that I changed, a lot. In fact, if you’ll give me a fair chance, you’ll discover that I’m a very different person from the headstrong girl my uncle remembered.”

That much was certainly true, she thought, aware of how bitter the words tasted in her mouth. The old Melanie could never have spoken such conciliatory sentences, not for a hundred million dollars. Even now, if it wasn’t for Nick, she might happily have suggested that Mr. Clay Logan take the damn Romeo Ruby and—

“I’d like nothing better than to discover just that,” he said. She had to admit he handled his victory well—his smile wasn’t the least big smug. “I believe Joshua wanted you to have his estate if you were ready to handle it. It would please me to be able to turn it over to you.” He leaned forward. “I’ll have my secretary send you a list of everything I’ll need first thing Monday morning. We can get started right away.”

But she didn’t stand. She couldn’t allow him to dismiss her—not yet. Her needs were more urgent than she had let on.

“How long do you think it will take?” she asked, trying to sound calm, unharried. “I mean, for you to complete your…evaluation and make a decision?”

He frowned. “I don’t know. It depends on what I find. As you know, the will stipulates that you have twelve months in which to prove that you should inherit. I can’t imagine that it could possibly take that long.” He tilted his head, studying her face. “Why—is there some urgency?”

“Yes,” she said uncomfortably, plucking at the buttons that quilted the leather of the sofa. “You see, I really need to move—to get out of the house I’m in.”

“Are you behind in your payments?”

She colored again. “No, no, of course not. I don’t get ‘behind’ in my payments. It’s just that I need to get into a better neighborhood—a safer neighborhood. I’ll sell my house, of course, but I’m afraid that will take too long. We need to move very soon.”

Uh-oh. She was babbling, not outlining the measured logic of a sensible young woman. This wasn’t how it had sounded in front of the mirror. But then, the mirror hadn’t given her that skeptical look.

“Right now? What’s the rush?”

“It’s Nick,” she said miserably. Clay’s eyes changed. Of course it was Nick, his disappointed gaze said. But she refused to let herself get defensive. “It’s just that I’m afraid he’s falling in with a bad crowd.”

Clay leaned back, raising one brow. “If you think you can find a neighborhood that’s immune to ‘bad crowds’, I’m afraid you’re searching for an Eden that doesn’t exist.”

Suddenly Melanie felt something warm and furry against her calf. Fudge apparently wanted to make friends. She dropped her hand onto his silky fur and softly scratched. At least it allowed her to avoid Clay’s too-perceptive eyes.

“I know, but…well, Nick’s given up his old friends from school. Our circumstances are rather limited, as you may already know, so he just doesn’t feel like one of them anymore. It’s destroyed his self-esteem.”

“What has? Not being rich? The boy can’t respect himself just because he no longer lives at Cartouche Court? Didn’t he know that, when he left your uncle’s custody, he left the goodies behind, too? The status address, weekly allowance, the credit lines at all the best stores…”

She flushed. “You make it sound like the worst kind of snobbery.”

“Isn’t it?”

“No, it isn’t.” She heard herself getting angry, but she couldn’t help it. “You don’t understand. You don’t realize how tough a private boys’ school can be. The students are—well, it’s ruthless if you can’t keep up.”

“On the contrary,” he said, “I know exactly what it’s like.” Clay gave her another of those wry smiles. “I went to a private school, too. Four long years as a scholarship student. It’s no fun, but it’s survivable.”

She stared at him, finding the concept strangely jarring. She tried to picture Clay Logan at fourteen or fifteen. Even harder, she tried to picture him ever feeling at a disadvantage. Was it possible that this man had ever been racked with insecurity, rejected by the rich boys, forced to seek companionship with near delinquents?

No. It was not possible—he had too much inner strength. Granted, she didn’t know him very well, but his personal pride was evident in the way he carried himself. The perfect square of his shoulders, the firm set of his angular jaw, the nononsense expression in his intelligent eyes, were all the proof she needed. If Clay Logan had been shunned because he possessed more brains than bank account, he would simply have pitied his critics and comfortably spent the four years alone.

So how could she admit to him that Nick wasn’t made of such stern stuff? That Nick’s ego was fragile, his self-image built on all the wrong things. Did she dare say she blamed her uncle for that, too?

“I’m sure Nick’s hurting,” Clay went on. “And I’m sorry for it. But leaving Joshua was Nick’s own idea. He didn’t like the restrictions Joshua placed on him—and he hoped you would be a more lenient guardian. It’s really no surprise, is it, that there was a price to pay for his freedom? There usually is.”

“Yes, but the price is too high!” She pressed her fingertips together tightly, holding her emotion in with every muscle.

“He’s taken up with some new kids, kids from our neighborhood. These boys are much tougher than he is. He…” She hoped she wouldn’t fall apart, thinking of how Nick had looked at the police station, so young, so frightened. “He follows their lead. This week, they were caught spray-painting city hall.”

Clay’s brows pulled together in distaste. “Then the problem is in Nick, Melanie. Not in your address.”

Frustration pressed like a fist on her chest. “I understand what you’re saying. He should be stronger, I know. But I have to deal with Nick as he is, not as he ought to be.”

His face was implacable, and suddenly she realized she was just plain tired of begging—it was so at odds with her natural temperament. She had done all she could. If Clay couldn’t feel any sympathy for Nick, then she would have to find another way.

She stood jerkily, feeling like a fool. She had abased herself for nothing. “I apologize for wasting your time,” she said coolly. “I had hoped that perhaps you could expedite this…this cute little trial my uncle cooked up. If you won’t, you won’t I don’t need to bore you with all the details of our personal problems.”

Clay rested his head on the heel of his hand, still relaxed in spite of her tension.

“You’re flying off the handle again,” he pointed out.

“No, I’m just late getting home. Thanks again for—”

“If you really feel that Nick is in danger where you are,” he broke in calmly, “why not move back into Cartouche Court?” He smiled at her horrified expression. “I’m serious, Melanie. Why not? Joshua’s will specifically stipulates that you may live here, rent free, during the twelve-month evaluation period. Why not take advantage of his offer? Why not come home?”

Why not? A hundred thousand memories, all of them unhappy, that was why not. She looked helplessly around the library, half-expecting to see her uncle lurking in the dark corners. But the clouds had passed over—the shadows now were honey-colored.

“Come home?” she repeated hollowly. Was this home?

“Come home,” Copernicus ordered in a fierce voice that was eerily like her uncle’s. “Come home, damn it.”

It was obviously unanimous. Even Fudge wrapped himself around her ankle, purring. She stared numbly down at the cat, wondering why she was even letting herself consider this insanity. She leaned down to pet him, stalling.

“Damn cat,” Copernicus said sullenly, ruffling his feathers irritably.

Clay had stood now, too, and was studying her closely. “Why don’t you at least give it some thought? It would be financially advantageous for you, and it might even, as you say, expedite the work you and I need to do together. Fewer faxes, no phone messages to go astray.” He sighed. “I could even get to know Nick better.”

Get to know Nick…? She realized suddenly, with a nervous tightening in her gut, what he meant. “Oh, that’s right. You…you live here now, don’t you?”

“Yes.” He grinned, and for the first time, in the brightening sunshine, she could see the gold flecks in his brown eyes. “But I’m staying in the guest house, in case you’re worried about appearances.”

“Well, I would have to be, wouldn’t I?” she said dryly. “Considering that my character and my judgment are now officially on trial.”

He laughed as if he thought she was quite witty, but she knew it was no more than the truth. She was the defendant, and Cartouche Court was to be her jail. And Clay Logan was prosecutor, jailer, judge and jury all in one deceptively charming package. She closed her eyes. The prisoner was in big, big trouble.