Raven on the Wing (13 page)

“Probably.” Her smile wavered for an instant. “If you were seen leaving, it could be dangerous for you. But—”

“But?”

“I don’t want you to go.”

He kissed her again, gazing into her eyes. “Do you have to see him today?”

Raven didn’t need the question clarified. “This afternoon—and tonight.”

“Then I can stay for a while.”

She hesitated. “Training and experience tell me you shouldn’t. It would be taking a chance, a big chance. What Hagen would call an unnecessary
risk. But I’ve given Leon and the security people the impression that I stay up late and sleep late; no one ever disturbs me until afternoon.”

Josh just barely could hear the music from her “jamming” tape player in the living room, and nodded in that direction. “Won’t anyone wonder about that? It’s been playing all night.”

Raven shook her head. “No, I often play it all night. On the theory that if you let people get used to something, they don’t pay any attention at all to it after a while.”

He brushed the dark, heavy hair away from her face and looked at her steadily, the love he felt very nearly overwhelming him. “I don’t want to do anything to put you or me in greater danger, but I don’t want to leave you.”

She didn’t hesitate this time. “Stay.”

They couldn’t completely shut out the world, but they did manage to forget it. For a while. The warm, wet intimacy of a shared shower sent them back to bed, and the sun was well up when they made it to the kitchen for a breakfast of
sorts. Neither dressed, because each glance caught and held, and getting rid of clothing was a waste of precious time.

Josh was conscious of that passing time, aware of the uncertain footing beneath them. Reluctant to press her for a commitment, he fought the instincts urging him to grab her and hold on tight. It was a next-to-impossible task, because Raven was so instantly and utterly responsive … yet her eyes remained enigmatic.

He was not a man who had felt uncertain of himself ever before in his life, but during that morning he learned the terrors of uncertainty. She had said that she loved him, and Josh believed her. She loved him, and yet their future was very much in doubt in spite of it. And not only because of her background but his own, he realized.

“Does who I am bother you?” he asked late that morning. Reluctantly, he was dressing to go, and Raven was curled up in the bed watching him.

She blinked, then smiled. “I’m not sure. It scares me a little, I think.”

Josh sat down on the edge of the bed and frowned. “Why?”

“Because you’re so visible.” She spoke slowly, obviously searching herself. “And I’ve never been visible. That file on you is incredible; everything you do is news. You and the people you know are world movers.”

“I’m just a man, Raven. Don’t ever forget that. And I don’t plan to be so visible in the future. I’ve had that. I have four houses—but none of them is
home
. I want a real home now. With you.” His hand reached out and lay warmly over the sheet covering her flat stomach. “Children.”

“I can’t think past today,” she whispered, trying not to imagine what it would be like to carry their child, trying not to let the magic of such a vision seduce her.

After a moment, Josh nodded. He leaned down to kiss her gently, but with an edge of desperation he wasn’t able to hide. And he could barely get out the words that were more plea than command: “Just promise me—”

“I won’t leave.” Her voice was steady. “I won’t run away from this.” She pushed a lock of black hair off his forehead.

He couldn’t ask for more, no matter how much he wanted to.

Raven was to meet Leon at his office building, and her alter ego was firmly in place when she ordered a security man at the door to park her Mercedes in the underground garage. She was cool and composed as she went up in the elevator. Still, despite her training and experience, the fact that her life had been changed the night before had left its mark.

For five years, she had lived in a world where there was, as Josh had observed, nothing certain. Every stranger met was a potential enemy, and it had been only rare moments, such as her meeting with him, when she had ignored the danger and suspicions that shadowed her life. She had all but forgotten how to open up to another human being, share herself.

But last night had changed her. Like a steeplechase jockey who made plans only “after the last race,” she couldn’t look ahead until danger was
past. Was that sheer superstition or just her innate realism?

But she loved Josh, loved him with a depth and certainty she hadn’t thought possible, and in a soft and secure corner of her mind she allowed herself to dream.

On the surface, however, Raven Anderson was an ice maiden, and it was this woman who lifted a cool brow at Theodore when she found him alone in Leon’s office.

“Miss Howard wasn’t at her desk,” she said, referring to Leon’s excellent secretary. “Where’s Leon?”

Spaniel eyes blinked behind his thick glasses as Theodore came forward to meet her with a blend of anxiety and entreaty. “They needed him downstairs, Miss Anderson; he asked me to make sure you were comfortable until he returned.”

Indifferently, she said, “I’ll be fine, Theodore. You needn’t wait.”

He came a step closer and licked his lips nervously. “You’re a beautiful woman, Miss, er, Raven.”

“Thank you.” Her voice was cold now, and she fought the urge to back away when he came closer still. She didn’t like the man; his anxious mannerisms made her somehow nervous, and the memory of his cold hands touching her once before had stayed with her a long time.

“I could fix you a drink,” he offered, his eyes focusing on her breasts.

“No.”

He glanced toward the closed door. “Leon’ll be a while. Why don’t we get comfortable on the couch?”

“You could learn a lot from Leon, Theodore.” She stared coldly at him, her distaste obvious. “He never makes clumsy passes.”

Theodore’s pale face flushed. “Don’t be so high and mighty,” he said, his voice abruptly derisive. “I know what you are,
Miss Anderson
. You’re worse than a whore. You buy and sell decent girls and make them into whores.”

Deep inside her in a cold place, Raven marked yet another score to be settled with him. But her voice remained coolly indifferent, and her expression was faintly amused. “The pot sneering
at the kettle, don’t you think? You work for Leon, and that makes you a pimp.”

Theodore caught her suddenly around her waist. His face was more deeply flushed and his eyes held an avid expression. “Pimps try out their girls,” he said hoarsely. But a ringing slap sent him staggering back with a curse and one hand held to his cheek.

“I think not. I’m not one of your girls. I also don’t belong to Leon, luckily for you. Get out of here.”

“You’ll regret that,” he said shakily.

Bored, Raven turned toward the bar and fixed herself a drink. She didn’t change expression even when the door slammed behind Theodore. Wandering to the window with her glass, she stood gazing out. Still performing. But this time, it was for the eye of a hidden camera. It was there, she knew, recording everyone who visited Leon’s office.

A few moments later he came in, and she had to wonder coldly if she had just passed another test. Impossible to tell, of course, from Leon’s bland, smiling face.

“Good afternoon, my dear. Sorry to keep you waiting.”

“No problem.” She watched him put away some papers in his desk, just barely catching the slight flick of his fingers on the underside of the desk. Her mind worked instantly, rapidly. Had he turned off a hidden tape recorder? The camera?

In a gentle tone, Leon said, “Unwise, my dear, to provoke Theodore.”

Unmoved, she said, “Did you expect me to tumble onto the couch for him, Leon? Was I supposed to do so because he works for you and you expect me to keep the help happy?”

“Did I ask you to?”

“You tell me.”

As always his gray eyes were unreadable. “No, my dear, I did not ask you. But Theodore is an unstable personality. Surely you’ve noticed? And you’re a survivor. It might perhaps have been wiser if you had … sunk your scruples?”

“Not that far.” She turned away from the window to place her empty glass on the bar. Boldly, she forced the issue. “Enjoyable as your
company is, Leon, I came here to fulfill a commission. Not to be pawed by a rabbity office boy. My clients are becoming impatient.”

“You spoke to them?”

Raven didn’t fall into the trap. “No. But I have a deadline, and I know my clients.”

Leon’s fingers flickered again beneath the desk, and that bothered Raven, for some reason. Especially when he continued on the subject she had opened.

“I believe you are well versed in your clients’ … tastes?”

“I know what they want.”

“Excellent. It will take a day or so to make the arrangements.”

“No blind sales, Leon.” She looked at him coolly. “I expect to examine the merchandise.”

“Of course.” He locked his desk, then came forward to lead her toward the door. “I will arrange it. And, by the way, my dear, I’ve never called you a whore. Never again call me a pimp.”

Raven’s mask held—just. There had been a
steely warning in his gentle tone. “My apologies, Leon,” she said.

Josh lit a cigarette and spoke into the phone. “And then?”

“And then they went to a restaurant,” Lucas reported briefly. “Just the two of them, boss. I can see both entrances from here; they’re still inside.”

“All right. Let me know when they start back to the penthouse.”

Lucas hesitated. “Boss … they’ll never know they’re being followed, but do you think this is smart? We were told to lay off.”

“I don’t trust Hagen’s so-called security measures,” Josh said flatly. “She’s in danger every moment she’s with Travers, and I want them watched.”

“You sign the checks.” Lucas sighed. “And I haven’t seen a sign of surveillance other than mine.”

“That’s good enough for me.”

Doubtful, Lucas said, “Well, hell, Josh, these
guys are supposed to be pros; they could be all around me and I’d never see them.”

“You’d see them.” In spite of worry, Josh smiled a little. “Is this the ex-cop the feds have been trying to entice away from me for years? The cop who was undercover for ten months to break a drug ring?”

“Bygone days,” Lucas said. “I’m getting old and rusty.”

“You’re a year younger than I am,” Josh retorted mildly.

“Well,
you
looked a mite weary this afternoon.”

“Never mind.”

Laughing, Lucas said, “I’ll check in when anything changes.” He hung up.

Rafferty shoved a paper across the desk to Josh. “Sign this.”

Obediently, Josh signed.

Glancing over at Zach, who was seated nearby, Rafferty said, “I could steal him blind; he never reads
anything.”

“You read it, didn’t you?” Josh asked absently.
Sighing, Rafferty filed the signed paper in his briefcase. “Uh-huh.”

Josh smiled suddenly. “Why do you think I pay you such an exorbitant salary? So I won’t have to read. What
was
that, anyway?”

“You just gave away money,” Rafferty told him politely.

“To who? Whom.”

“Serena’s latest orphanage.”

Josh eyed his attorney thoughtfully. “If I remember correctly, you said the last time she wanted an endowment fund set up that you were proof against Rena’s wiles.”

Rafferty examined his fingernails. “Yes. Well.” Looking up to meet amused eyes, he said accusingly, “Even if I managed
not
to succumb, you would. I just thought I’d save time and draw up the damned papers.”

Zach, who had let most of the conversation pass unheard, looked up then from the computer printout he was studying. “Did you know Travers had a wife?”

Josh looked over at his security chief. “Had. She died years ago, didn’t she?”

“Yeah.” Zach frowned. “Three years ago. His yacht went down, and they never found her body. Says here, he was in Geneva at the time. Police put the blame on a boiler explosion.”

“It happens,” Rafferty noted. “Not that I’d know about yachts, of course. My clutch-fisted employer—”

“Is going to dock your salary for that remark,” Josh told him. Then he sighed and his mind, never far from thoughts of Raven, returned completely to her. There was so much in this situation he couldn’t hope to control, and the danger she faced scared him half to death. “I hope to high heaven she’s all right.”

“She is,” the lawyer told him firmly. “Lucas is on watch, and you know he’s damned good.”

Josh stubbed out his cigarette and immediately lit another, and tried to feel reassured by Rafferty’s remark. “I know. It’s just—Dammit, everything could blow up in her face; Travers is about as stable as nitro.” He frowned a few moments in brooding silence. “Zach? Get me a gun, will you?”

The big security chief looked up, his abstracted
expression instantly replaced by faint anxiety. “Josh—”

“Is that a problem?”

“No. But—”

“I promise not to shoot my foot off, all right?”

Zach knew there was little danger of that, since Josh was expert with firearms, and the impatience in Josh’s voice was obvious; he didn’t intend to argue about this. Sighing, he murmured, “I’ll have it by tomorrow.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m not worried about job security,” Rafferty said as if to a fourth party. “Even if Josh gets his head blown off, I happen to know that Serena is currently his heir. She’ll keep us all busy for years.”

“That reminds me—” Josh was frowning.

“Yes,” Rafferty murmured. “I thought it would.”

Fretfully, Kelsey said, “He’s following them—that detective of Long’s.”

“Of course,” Hagen said calmly.

The redhead shot a quick glance at his boss. “You warned them, didn’t you?”

“Certainly.”

“But you aren’t surprised?”

Hagen lit a fat cigar and contemplated it with an air of satisfaction. “My boy, when you’ve studied human nature as long as I have, you’ll discover that people are rarely surprising.”

Kelsey concentrated on staying well back from Lucas Kendrick’s rented car, frowning. “Amateurs. They’re going to botch it,” he said gloomily.