A Fashionable Affair (14 page)

“I’m going to be here until ten, at least,” he told
her. “I spent most of the day seeing clients and I’ve
got to go through the papers Alice put together to
see if they’re okay.”

“Oh,” Patsy said forlornly. “That means you
won’t be home until eleven.”

His voice sharpened. “What’s the matter, Red?
Are you all right?”

Patsy hesitated and then decided to tell him
about Frank later. He might feel he had to come
home at once, and much as she would like that, she
knew she shouldn’t let him. “I’m fine,” she said.
“Just lonely.”

“Oh.” His voice changed subtly. “Well, I’ll try to
remedy that when I get home.”

“That would be nice.” Her voice was very soft.
“I’ll see you later, darling.”

“See you later.”

After she had hung up, Patsy resolutely went into
the kitchen and fixed herself a dinner she really
didn’t want. She then turned on the TV and sat
through two situation comedies she didn’t hear. At
ten o’clock she ran a hot tub and tried to relax.
After putting on a nightgown, she got into bed with
a book.

It was almost eleven-thirty when she heard
Michael’s key in the lock. Patsy put her book on the
night table and looked up as he came into her bed
room. Miraculously, all her tension disappeared at
the sight of him; and her spirits soared. “Well, well,
well, Mr. Melville,” she said. “It’s about time.”

“What a day,” he grunted. “I had to tell one of my
clients that he was being systematically ripped off
by his warehouse manager. He was not happy.” He
took off his suit jacket and hung it on the back of
the desk chair.

“What happened?” Patsy asked curiously.

“It’s a maintenance supply firm—they sell things
like toilet paper, industrial cleaners, boiler addi
tives, stuff like that to commercial buildings and
industrial parks. But the manager was also quietly
selling a full order of supplies to three local private schools, who didn’t know he was pocketing their payments as a nice tax-free benefit to himself.” He
took off his tie and draped it over his jacket.

Patsy linked her arms around her updrawn
knees. “And how did you find this out?”

“Easy enough. I matched up the supplies actually
on hand with the supplies that were supposed to be
on hand. There was a noticeable gap between the
two.” His shirt had followed his tie by now.

She rested her chin on her knees. “How did you
discover this gap when apparently no one else
had?”

“I went to the warehouse and counted,” Michael
said briefly, sitting on the edge of the bed and tak
ing off his shoes.

Patsy regarded his smoothly muscled back in
admiration. “You have the most suspicious mind of
anyone I’ve ever met. And the really sad thing is, you’re usually right.”

“Someone has to be suspicious,” he answered, his
voice a little muffled. “If only to protect the gener
ous innocents”—he straightened up and turned
around—”like you.”

She reached up and ran light fingers over his
cheekbone. “My knight in shining armor,” she said
softly, and his black brows abruptly snapped
together and his face hardened.

“What is this?” he asked sharply, putting his hand
on her upper arm.

Patsy had seen the marks in her bath but had
quite forgotten them in the bliss of his arrival. “I
had a rather unpleasant encounter with Frank Car
bone,” she told him in a carefully neutral voice.
“You know, my partner in Ebony Lad.”

“Did he do this to your arm?”

She had never seen Michael look this way. “He just held my arm for a minute,” she answered has
tily. “It didn’t even hurt. It’s just that my skin
bruises so easily.”

His nostrils flared a bit and then he said quietly,
“I think you’d better tell me what happened.”

“Well, he came to the modeling session,” she
began, and proceeded to detail her entire encounter with Frank. When she had finished, Michael
called Frank a couple of names that provoked her
heartfelt agreement. “I couldn’t agree more,” she
said primly, “although I’m too much of a lady to say
so myself.”

He looked at her and his face relaxed a trifle. His
eyes were now pure green, “They found they
couldn’t scare me off, so they decided to try you.”

“That’s what I figured,” she replied compla
cently, and a flicker of amusement stirred in his
cold green eyes. “The thing that really concerns
me, Michael,” she went on earnestly, “is, how did Frank know I was shooting for Redman Fashions?” He didn’t reply. “You think this crew is tied up with
the sports-clothes contract, too, don’t you? That’s
why you’ve been so interested in how they adver
tised.”

“Sweetheart,” he said very gently.

“You must be right,” she said. “How else would
Frank have known where to find me? He must be connected with the fashion deal. He must be.”

“I always said there was nothing wrong with your
brain.”

“The shopping centers too?” she asked hollowly.

“I don’t know, Red. I’m going to fly to Illinois
tomorrow and look at one of these shopping cen
ters for myself.”

“Oh,” she said dismally. He was going away
again.

He misunderstood her expression. “Patsy, do
you want me to just hand this over to Internal Reve
nue? I really don’t think you’re in any danger, but if
you’re afraid, I’ll turn it over tomorrow.”

“Why do you want to keep on it alone, Michael?”
she asked slowly. “I mean, really.”

He smiled a little crookedly. “Pure egotism,
sweetheart. That bastard Garfield slipped out from
under once before, and I guess I just don’t trust anyone else to get an airtight case on him this time
around.”

She looked at his thin, concentrated face during a
brief moment’s silence, and recognized the dedica
tion there. He really was out to make the world safe
for the generous innocents—the ones like his
father, whom the barracudas had destroyed. “I’m
going to Illinois with you,” she announced firmly.

“Oh, no,” he began.

“Oh, yes,” she replied very firmly.

“Patsy, I have a good friend—an ex-policeman,
in fact— and I’m going to get him to come and play
bodyguard for you. Just in case, you understand.
You’ll be far safer here than you would be with
me.”

Hah, she thought. So he did think he might be in
danger. “Whither thou goest, I will go,” she quoted, and smiled. “You can’t dump me, Michael, so don’t
even try. That’s my shopping center you’re talking
about, remember.”

He looked down into her upturned face, and his
eyes began to turn from green to gold. “I don’t
want to dump you, Red,” he said, his voice a little
deeper than usual.

Patsy lay back against her pillows and sighed very
sensuously. He leaned over and put his lips to her
white throat. She sighed again. “Oh, Michael,” she
murmured, and slid caressing hands into his thick
black hair.

Patsy awoke the following morning to find
Michael’s arm flung across her shoulders. He was
lying on his stomach, still deeply asleep, and she lay
still, savoring the warmth and nearness of him. The
light in the room was gray and she could hear the sound of rain on the window. The arm pinning her
to the bed shifted and she turned her head on the
pillow. “Good morning, darling,” she said softly.

“Mmm.” The long lashes lifted. “That’s a nice
sound to wake up to.” He stirred and then sat up.
“What time is it?”

She lay back on her pillow and watched him. “I
don’t know.”

He grunted, leaned across her, and turned the
bedside clock toward him. It was six-forty-five. He
yawned and slid back down. “This is a damned
small bed,” he said.

Patsy settled herself comfortably into the curve
of his arm. “It’s the bed of my girlhood,” she
informed him. “It’s bigger than a twin—Mother
always called it a three-quarter bed.”

“Well, it sure is cozy.”

“Are you complaining?”

He chuckled. “No.”

“I never noticed that it was small. But then, I’ve
never shared it before. It’s plenty big enough for
one.”

He didn’t say anything, and she sighed. She was
afraid to presume too much with him, afraid to
attribute more to this affair than he. But she
wanted him to know, at least a little, what it meant
to her. And what she had said was true: none of her
boyfriends had ever shared this bed with her. She
had always attributed her reluctance to the ghost of
her mother, but she realized now that it had been
more than that. She sighed again.

“You sound very melancholy,” he murmured near her ear.

“Do I? I suppose it’s the weather.”

He tightened his arm around her and she smiled. “What time do we leave for Illinois?”

“Not until this afternoon. I have to go to the
office this morning. Do you want to come with me?”

“Do you want me hanging around your office all
morning?” she countered.

“That way I won’t have to drive back into the city
to pick you up.”

“I might have known it was something like that,”
she said without rancor. “We’ll compromise. You
can drop me at Sally’s for the morning.”

“Okay,” he agreed. He kissed the top of her
head. “Let’s get moving, then.”

She didn’t stir.

His hand was slowly moving up and down her
arm. “I have a few clients to see this morning.”

“Mmm.”

He moved away from her a little and propped
himself on the arm that had been holding her close.
“Circe,” he murmured in a deep, slow voice.

The pillow was soft under her head, the sheets
warm from the heat of their bodies. Her nightgown
lay in a heap beside the bed, where he had thrown it
the night before. He pulled the covers down to her
waist, baring her to the cool morning air.

“Michael!” she protested, half-laughing. Then
his two warm hands covered her breasts, and he
bent to kiss her. She quivered under his touch,
warm and yielding and sweet as honey.

“Christ,” he said. “Patsy.”

And she reached up to pull him closer.

* * * *

They started later than Michael had planned, but
he didn’t complain. He dropped Patsy at Sally’s and
said he’d be back at about two. With his sister looking, Michael didn’t kiss Patsy, but waved a casual
farewell to them both as he reversed out of the
driveway and turned down the street.

“Brr,” remarked Sally, who was wearing jeans
and a knit shirt, “it’s chilly this morning. Come on
in.”

Patsy followed her into the kitchen, picked Mat
thew out of his walker, and sat with the baby on her
lap.

“He’s a real Melville, this one,” she said to Sally as
she regarded her godchild appraisingly. “He
already looks smart.”

Sally grinned. “We have some pictures of
Michael at that age and you’d swear they were pic
tures of Matthew.”

“I’ll bet,” Patsy murmured, feeling a pang of
envy. How she would love to have a baby who
looked like Michael. She kissed the downy head of
Michael’s nephew and let him play with the gold
chain around her neck.

“Michael said something about you and he going
to Illinois,” Sally remarked from the stove, where she was putting on coffee.

“Yes. We’re going to check out one of those shop
ping centers Fred was always buying for me.” The
baby lost interest in her chain and grabbed for an
enticing red-gold curl. “I have a ghastly feeling
Michael doesn’t think it exists.”

“Oh, dear,” Sally said. “I hate to tell you this,
Patsy, but my brother has the most depressing habit
of being right.”