License to Love (3 page)

“Uh-oh. I hope that doesn’t mean, ‘Of course, a slick, fast-talking, back-slapping arm-twister.’” Steve’s smile was wry, his tone self-deprecating. “I know that’s a common perception of lobbyists but I’ve tried to go against the ingrained stereotype. I don’t slap backs and I don’t twist arms, Michelle. I simply do the job I’ve been hired to do—that is, to present my clients’ views to the legislators.”

He was serious, earnest and sincere. Michelle felt a pang of guilt for the lobbyist-bashing she and other staffers periodically indulged in. “I just meant that I should’ve known a legislative engineer is another term for lobbyist,” she said quickly. “I’ve heard it before, but not very often.” “Probably the same semantics genius who invented domestic engineer for housewife came up with legislative engineer for lobbyist.” Steve smiled ingenuously. “Anyway, I know how busy you must be and I won’t take up any more of your time. I just wanted to introduce myself to you and invite you and the rest of the committee studying the bill on hazardous waste elimination to lunch.”

His smile broadened and there was humor in his warm dark eyes. “Hmm, that didn’t come out very well—mentioning lunch and hazardous waste in the same breath. Can I try it again? I’ll try to come up with something a shade more, er, appetizing.”

His good humor was infectious. Michelle couldn’t help but smile back. But she did remember her position and his, and asked, “What is your interest in the bill?”

“My client is Allied Medical Technologies, Incorporated. They build incinerators that bum medical waste from hospitals, doctors’ offices and labs. They would like to be awarded the contract to build incinerators on the sites selected by the state, so they’re very interested in this bill Senator Dineen is sponsoring. As AMT’s lobbyist, I’d like to meet the committee members and present pertinent information to them before the bill is voted out of committee and sent to the floor.”

“I see,” said Michelle. And she did. If his efforts were successful to his client’s cause, he would earn a substantial bonus in addition to the annual retainer paid by the company. The bonus sum grew with each degree of success achieved, beginning with getting a bill introduced, escalating to getting it through a committee and finally paying off big if the bill passed the state House and Senate.

Most of the lobbyists in Harrisburg were lawyers, trade association representatives or public relations consultants, full-time employees of corporations, labor unions or special interest groups. Steve and his partners were independent “hired guns” who represented dozens of different clients, firms that didn’t want a full-time lobbyist, only a representative on certain, specific issues.

“I understand the committee will be meeting again next week,” Steve continued. “May I take all of you to lunch the day before? If that’s not okay for everyone, we’ll reschedule at your convenience, of course. I’m nothing if not accommodating.” His grin playfully mocked himself and the entire system.

He was upfront about his intentions and the procedure to be followed. Michelle thought he was a refreshing change from the smarmy types who tried to pretend that lobbyist/ legislative socializing was something more than purely business. The difference between business associates and personal friends had always been quite clear to her.

She reminded herself of that fact now, when she found herself smiling at Steve in a certain way—the way a woman would smile at a man she was attracted to, with her head demurely tilted, her eyelashes lowered, her lips slightly parted. Quickly, Michelle tried to rearrange her face into the kind of professional smile reserved for lobbyists like Don Exner, a fifty-one-year-old, five foot eight, two hundred pound, married father of four.

Flushing, she thought she saw a knowing gleam in Steve’s eyes, as if he knew exactly the effect he was having upon her. He probably did, Michelle decided grimly. A man with his looks had to be accustomed to women swooning over him, even throwing themselves at him. Not that she’d done either! Nor would she.

“I’ll relay your invitation to lunch to the committee and get back to you,” she said briskly. Yes, that was better. It was exactly the way she sounded when replying to Don Exner or any other lobbyist.

“Thank you, Michelle. I’ll look forward to hearing from you.”

It was a generic statement somehow made to sound promisingly intimate by his whiskey-smooth tones. His departing smile left her weak-kneed. Michelle ran her hand over her neatly French-braided blond hair and sought to regain her equilibrium from the sensual onslaught. It was as if Cupid had started shooting ballistic missiles instead of arrows.

Shortly after his departure, Claire Collins and Leigh Wilson, two other Dineen staffers, rushed into Michelle’s office.

“Who was that guy? I couldn’t believe my eyes!” exclaimed Leigh. “I looked up and there he was—a Greek god come to life!”

“She was speechless, all right,” seconded Claire. “Leigh looked at him, opened her mouth and not a single word came out.” She did a comic imitation of Leigh, staring glassy-eyed and slack-jawed.

“Don’t tell me you weren’t affected by him, Claire,” retorted Leigh. “You’re married, not dead. So what did he want, Michelle? Whatever it is, I volunteer.”

“He’s a lobbyist,” said Michelle. “His name is Steve Saraceni and he represents Allied Medical Technologies. He wants to take the committee to lunch next week and talk about a hazardous waste incinerator.”

Claire groaned. Leigh looked disappointed. “Hazardous waste? How gross! Still, he’s so gorgeous he might even be able to make that sound romantic.”

Leigh’s rhapsodizing increased Michelle’s sense of disconcertment. After all, her reaction to Steve Saraceni hadn’t been much different. And now even Claire, a starry-eyed newlywed, was chiming in with appreciative remarks about Saraceni’s incredible sex appeal. His effect on women was dynamite indeed, and Michelle knew he couldn’t help but be aware of it. She shifted uncomfortably, longing for a change of subject.

Leigh wasn’t. “He wasn’t wearing a wedding ring,” she noted. “If he were married, you can bet his wife would insist on one. That means he’s single, he’s available! And so am I!”

“So is Michelle,” Claire added dampeningly. “And she’s the one on the committee he’s lobbying. She’s the one going to lunch with him.”

Michelle felt her cheeks turn pink. “Have you two ever heard the term ‘conflict of interest’? We haven’t really needed to worry about it because Ed is a junior senator and doesn’t have enough influence or power for the lobbyists to come around much. But—”

“Conflict of interest,” Claire interrupted, grinning. “It sounds exciting, forbidden, passionate. Go for it, Michelle.”

Michelle smiled in spite of herself. In a moment, she was laughing along with the others. After all, Claire was deliberately being outrageous. Everyone in Senator Dineen’s office knew how hardworking, loyal and dedicated Michelle was to her job. If there was a single staffer in Harrisburg who wouldn’t ever need to worry about becoming embroiled in a conflict of interest, that person would be Michelle Carey.

Steve returned to his office to find his cousin Saran painting her nails while simultaneously talking on the telephone. She had the receiver tucked into the curve between her neck and shoulder and from her giggles, Steve was absolutely certain that the call had nothing at all to do with business.

He suppressed a groan. The family had foisted Saran upon him four months ago, after she’d completed a year of business school that had allegedly prepared her for office work. In what type of office, Steve had never been able to ascertain but he had dutifully created this job of receptionist for her, according to the family credo: Saracenis stick together. Bonded like glue, Steve often added, not always facetiously.

He heaved a sigh. “Get off the phone, Saran.”

Saran scowled, but quickly obeyed. “Heather and I were making plans to go see Boiled in Oil in Philly next weekend,” she told him eagerly. “And you’ll never guess what, Steve? Heather knows a girl who knows Boiled in Oil’s drummer. She’s going to get us introduced to the band!”

“Meeting
Boiled in Oil.
Now there’s a dream come true,” Steve said dryly.

“You’re too old to appreciate them. You baby boomers are stuck way back in time with, like, the Rolling Stones.”

“I wouldn’t have appreciated a heavy metal punk catastrophe like
Boiled in Oil
at any age, Saran. I happen to have taste.”

“Not in music—or in women,” Saran shot back. “I’ve met some of the babes you go out with. They actually make
me
look smart! No wonder you don’t want to get married. Those airheads you date are as far removed from wife material as—as—”

“—as Boiled in Oil’s noise is from real music,” Steve finished triumphantly. He headed toward his office.

“I told Heather that you’re boring and old but she still thinks you’re hot,” Saran called after him. “She wants to go out with you really bad. Want to come to Confetti’s with us tonight? That hot new team from WTXH radio are going to be the DJs.”

Steve considered spending an evening with Saran and her friend Heather and decided that he would rather be—well, boiled in oil. “Thanks, but I’m busy tonight.”

Sitting in his office, it struck him that for years he had been dating girls the age that Saran and Heather were now. In fact, Heather, with her blatantly sexy, flashy style, could even be categorized as just his type. For some inexplicable reason, the revelation horrified him. He was fourteen years older than Saran; he’d always thought of her as a little kid. So wouldn’t that make girls her age just kids, too?

Like a man drowning, he saw his dating life flash before his eyes. Young women of twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two, used to be his peers. Now, suddenly, he was a man who dated little girls?

Inexplicably, he thought of Michelle Carey. She was no little girl, though she was young for the position she held. In fact, the entire Dineen staff were in their twenties and early thirties, a hardworking, ambitious and tight-knit group who were not yet well known among the state capital’s political establishment.

Steve had done some research to learn more, but for some unfathomable and disconcerting reason, he’d found his interest focused more on Senator Dineen’s aide, Michelle Carey, than the senator himself.

She was a serious career woman and She dressed to prove it. The two times he’d seen her, today and last week while on a prior reconnaissance mission, she had been wearing practical, businesslike dark suits that looked like they’d sprung from that decade-old office primer
Dress for Success.

It was a look Steve detested. Women should dress like women in alluring fabrics, eye-pleasing colors, and figure-enhancing styles. He envisioned Michelle in a short, tight, red leather mini and a soft, clingy sweater. The swift, scorching heat of arousal stirred in his groin.

Which brought him to another thing he’d learned about Michelle. Regardless of the way she dressed, she was a knockout. She had thick blond hair he would love to loosen from the tight, practical styles she favored. He wanted to see those dark golden tresses falling sexily around her shoulders—or spread out on his pillow as he leaned over her in the quiet hush of his bedroom.

He pictured her beautiful china blue eyes blazing with passion for him. He wanted to taste her soft, tempting mouth, to feel her lips under his. Her luscious, curvaceous body tantalized his imagination. Her feminine appeal and shapeliness could not be disguised, not even by those prim and proper office uniforms of hers.

He was attracted to her. And for Steve Saraceni, a sexual attraction quickly blazed into a full-blown affair. There was every reason to suppose this one could, too. Michelle was attracted to him, too, he knew it. He had seen the look in her blue eyes and read it for what it was—awareness, attraction, desire. He was too experienced not to recognize the most subtle signs from the most reserved woman.

Normally he would act at once. A phone call. A strategically thoughtful little gift. An invitation to dinner. Candlelight, wine, candy and flowers—they might be cliche but they never failed. He was a virtuoso at cultivating the attraction, escalating the sexual tension. When he carefully turned up the heat, they proceeded directly to the bedroom.

His campaign was so familiar to him, he could conduct it by rote. Lately he had been.

But this was different;
she
was different. He had always been careful not to become involved with any woman whose path crossed his in the legislative/lobbyist world. There was his business life and there was his social life, which he regarded as two very separate entities. Steve didn’t believe in mixing the two. He’d seen the result when others had.

A serious conflict of interest could arise and lead to mutually damaged careers. But there was an even greater danger when a man and a woman with education, business and other common interests came together in an affair.
Marriage!
Steve had seen it happen time and time again and vowed it was not going to happen to him—at least not for a long, long time. Marriage would interfere with his work, his life, his golf game!

It hadn’t been too hard to maintain his resolve. He admired his female colleagues in the political world; he respected them and enjoyed their company. But he wasn’t attracted to them. Michelle Carey made him rethink his pledge of not mixing business with pleasure. Suddenly the prospect seemed tempting, not foolish. Exciting, not unthinkable. Even the inherent danger of it appealed.

But he didn’t reach for the phone to make the call that would kick off his official courtship campaign. Steve Sara-ceni was cool and calculating, a man not driven by impulse or passion. He would give himself time to see if his attraction to Michelle Carey was merely a passing trifle. He wouldn’t see her until the committee lunch and if he still wanted her, then he would decide whether or not to pursue her.

Smiling, feeling pleased with himself, he called a client with an update on the House reaction to their most recent proposal. Thoughts of Michelle, women and sex were promptly evicted from his mind. Nothing distracted Steve Saraceni from the business at hand.