Warm Hearts (26 page)

Dark wavy hair, mussed by sleep, fell across his brow. His jaw bore the faintest shadow of a beard. His nose was straight; his lips firm, slightly parted. But what intrigued her most was the expression that the camera's soft lens had captured as he'd stared into his dreams with the phone cradled against his ear. A moment of vulnerability, an exquisite blend of lonely and loving that reached out to every woman on earth who had ever glimpsed a masterpiece and craved to touch it.…

“That's a crock!” The angry voice of Anthony Parish suddenly filled the room, startling her from her reverie, bringing her head sharply up. Her brother's hand gripped the phone, and his good-looking features were harsh in contrast to those of the face beneath her fingertips. “I don't care
how
long it takes to substantiate those facts! I'm paying top dollar and I want results!” He cast a glance at Leslie, then shook his head. “No, no. Not that way. Listen, you work on it. I'll be in touch later.”

Replacing the receiver, he pushed himself from his chair and rounded the desk to take the seat beside her. Despite the flecks of gray that whispered through his hair, he was tall and lean, carrying his forty years well. “Sorry about that, Les,” he murmured, “but someone's got to keep on top of them.”

“I thought you had assistants to handle things like that.”

Steepling his fingers, he leaned forward with a sigh. “The buck stops here. If I want this publishing house to make it in a struggling economy, it's
my
responsibility. Quality is the name of the game. At least for me it is. I want every story we print to be right.” He shot a glance at the magazine that lay open on Leslie's lap.
“Man's Mode
has done well precisely because it's a notch above.” He sighed again. “But that's not your worry—” he sent her a teasing smile “—unless you'd like to change your mind and join us.”

Leslie held up a slender hand. “No, thanks. I rather like being the black sheep of the family. I mean, you've got the publishing end and Diane's got sporting goods and Brenda's tied up in computers, while dad sits up there as chairman of the board. No,” she smiled, “I'll stick to my kids.”

Teasing yielded to a moment's admiration. “You love your work, don't you?”

“Um hmm.”

“I'm glad, Les. Hey!” The rotating file in Tony's mind must have given a sudden flip. “You've got a birthday coming up.”

“Um hmm.”

“A big one.”

She'd been trying to forget. “Um hmmmmm.”

“What do you want?”

She crinkled up her nose. “Nothing. Really.”

“Come on. It's not every day that a woman turns thirty.”

“Thank God.”

“Leslie,” her brother chided, “you're not feeling your age, are you? Hell, self-made woman and all, you're doing better than ever.”

On the surface she was. Inside, though, there was a growing sense of restlessness. “I suppose,” she said thoughtfully.

“So what's your pleasure?” He sat back in his chair and eyed her speculatively. “A watch? Better still—” his brown eyes lit up “—how about a fur jacket? Something soft and chic?”

“Really, Tony. I don't want anything.…”

He arched a brow. “I won't take no for an answer. You may be a successful professional, but you're still my little sister. In my book, that gives me the right to dote. So,” he breathed, as though the matter was settled, “what'll it be? For your thirtieth—a special something.…”

Leslie thought for a minute. Her gaze dropped to the advertisement that still lay open on her lap. Her forefinger traced the swath of skin whose lightly bronzed color ran unbroken from head to foot. She chewed on her bottom lip, then smiled. “What I'd
really
like,” she announced boldly, “is the use of the house on St. Barts for a week … and
him
.”

*   *   *

Three weeks later she arrived on St. Barthélémy. Having woken up at four-thirty that morning to pack and catch the first plane out of JFK, she was tired. Wearing the wools that a frigid predawn February morning in New York had demanded, she was sweaty. Greeting the beauty of the Caribbean through hot, heavy eyes, she was miserable. To top it all, the taxi she'd taken from the airport had had a flat tire several hundred yards from the villa, and desperate to lay her head on a fresh, cool pillow, she'd taken her things and left the driver to deal with his jack and spare.

Toting a duffel bag over one arm and a bag of books and her purse over the other, she struggled along the narrow road, which wound uphill. Though she clung to its shoulder, where the succession of palm parasols might protect her from the strong midday Caribbean sun, she felt beads of sweat gather along her hairline, moisten her neck, trickle in a tiny stream down the valley between her breasts. For the moment the beauty of the island was lost on her. She simply wanted to lie down.

She sneezed once and sniffled as the road curved, then moaned aloud when the familiar structure with its red-tiled roof and white stucco walls emerged from its tropical camouflage. That was all the incentive she needed to quicken her step. Her legs felt like rubber, but she didn't care. Another two minutes and she'd be there, sprawled in her favorite room—in
everybody's
favorite room—with the overhead fan gently cooling the air, the palm fronds dancing on the skylight overhead, the sea strutting its lush azure stuff beyond the open sliding doors, from the sparkling white sands of the beachfront to the far horizon.

Fairly running the last few steps, she shifted from one elbow to the other the heavy wool sweater she'd already stripped off and dug into her purse for the key. When it eluded her, she tugged the purse around and peered bleary-eyed into the scrambled abyss of its interior. She rummaged again, whispered a soft oath and peered a second time, finally shaking the bag to hear the telltale rattle that helped her zero in on the spot. Another minute's ferreting produced the key.

With a twist of her hand, the front door opened. As cool air enveloped her, she smiled her relief. “Thank you, Martine,” she rasped softly, vowing to repeat it louder later in the week when she came face to face with the woman who must have been in earlier that morning in anticipation of her arrival. And a twist of fate it was that Martine was a morning person. Leslie's original plans had been to arrive that evening; only a last minute cancellation on the early-bird flight had brought her in at noontime.

Closing the door behind her, she stooped to let her bags fall from her damp and tired shoulders. Her purse and sweater slid to the floor nearby. Mopping her clammy forehead on her sleeve, she stepped out of her leather pumps and, with her fingers at the button of her plum-and-blue plaid skirt, started down the stairs.

After ten years of family vacations here, she'd come to take the villa for granted. Only a visitor would be entranced by its unique design. Nestled into the cliffs rising above the sands on the western end of the small island, it sprawled across three spacious levels. The top level, even with the road, held the front foyer, one wall of which was glassed and looked out toward the ocean, the other two walls of which opened to lateral bedrooms. The bottom level, to the right as the house followed the natural cropping of the cliff, held the airy kitchen and living room and opened on to a flagstoned terrace, itself graduated on two planes, the lowest of which was a hop, skip and jump from the beach.

It was the middle level of the house to which Leslie headed unswervingly. Connected to top and bottom by an open staircase, it was the one most coveted by whichever family member had the good fortune to arrive first, or, all too often and to Leslie's misfortune, needed the space. This level held an airy den and the exquisite master-bedroom suite, of which Leslie had every intention of taking sole possession for the week.

Bent on undressing and showering, she had her skirt unzipped and halfway down her hips by the time she reached the foot of the stairs. Quickly hopping free of the heavy wool, she tossed it over the back of a chair in the den, then reached down to pull her lavender turtleneck jersey from the elastic confines of her matching wool tights. Feeling more like a wilting violet than a stylish New Yorker, she padded toward the bedroom.

The door was open. Tugging the turtleneck over her head, she stumbled across the threshold, and was in the process of peeling the clinging fabric from her sweaty arms when she cried out in alarm and came to an abrupt halt. Clamping her teeth into her soft lower lip, she stared at the bed.

It was supposed to be empty. It was supposed to be freshly made and waiting just for her. It was supposed to be all hers for the week.

Instead, the covers were pulled back, and the rumpled sheets were draped—just barely—over a large body that was very definitely male and just as definitely sound asleep.

Sagging against the doorjamb with her turtleneck crushed against the pale mauve lace of her bra, she was seized by a wave of fury. Tony had promised! He'd said he would clear it with the others so that she might have the villa to herself for the week! Was this a friend of his? Or Diane's … or Brenda's? It just wasn't fair! The one time she'd wanted it … wanted it.…

Suddenly her anger faded as a memory seemed to mesh with the tableau before her. Decorated in white and rattan, with pillows and cushions of an imported Italian weave, the room glowed beneath the noontime sun, which stole through the palms above the skylight to lend a dreamlike quality to the air. The ceiling fan whirred softly overhead, augmenting the gentlest of breezes that danced off the ocean and whispered in through the open glass sliding doors. But it was to the bed that Leslie's eyes were riveted. To the bed … and the figure so carelessly spread atop it.

There was something familiar about him. Feeling a sneeze coming on, she pressed her hand to her nose in hopes of suppressing it as, entranced, she studied the limp torso and sprawled limbs. The length of lightly bronzed leg that extended from the sheet spoke of superior height. The firmness of his thigh and corresponding leanness of his stomach attested to commendable fitness. The solidly muscular structure of his shoulder hinted at bodily pride. He was, in a word, stunning.

He lay on his back with his head fallen to the side. One hand, fingers splayed, rested on his stomach. She couldn't help but note how comfortable it looked, cushioned by the soft ribbon of hair that narrowed from the more ambitious covering of his chest. His other hand was thrown out to the side in a gesture she might have seen as pure invitation had the man not been so very obviously asleep.

Hugging her jersey to her throat, Leslie dared creep closer. Eyes wide in disbelief, she stared. She'd seen that face before. Even in repose it held a certain expression of vulnerability that immediately conjured up images of another bed, another setting. There was the hair, dark and mussed by sleep … the nose, straight, almost aristocratic … the sensually enticing shadow of a beard. As her eye tripped down his body once more, her heart began to pound with understanding. Oh, yes, she'd seen that face before.
And
that body. This time there was no workbench in the background, no sculptor's tools, no half-finished piece of art. This time his sheet covered the strip of flesh at his hip that had so taunted her before. This time the bed was in no photographer's studio but in her family's own villa.

Without realizing what she was doing, she sniffed the air in search of the unique scent of Homme Premier. But her nose was so stuffed she only succeeded in sending herself in a paroxysm of coughing, from which she emerged in horror to watch the man on the bed begin to move.

First his chest expanded with a deep, indrawn breath. His lips thinned, his brow furrowed. He turned his dark head on the pillow, stretching the outflung arm up over his head. Leslie swallowed hard when the sheet slipped precariously low on his abdomen.

Her gaze returned to his face in time to see one eye open—and stare at her blankly. When it was joined by the other, she saw that they were a warm shade of brown. The man blinked, dusting thick mahogany fringes against the high line of his cheek, then frowned, then blinked again and stared at her. Finally, as though abruptly recalling something, he bolted upright.

“My God!” he exclaimed, thrusting his fingers through the thick swath of hair that waved gently over his brow. “I'm sorry! I was going to be up and showered and dressed long before you arrived!” Frowning again, he looked toward the skylight, then reached for his watch from the stand beside the bed and stared at it in confusion. “Twelve-forty? But you weren't supposed to be in until seven tonight.”

“I got an early flight,” Leslie droned in a near monotone, then shook her blond head in distress. “I … don't … believe it.”

“What don't you believe?”

“You.”

His expression was immediately endearing, as though his only purpose in life was to please her, and having failed that, he was crushed. “I've done something wrong already?”

“You're here. I don't … believe it.”

All vestige of drowsiness gone, the man looked down at his body innocently, before breaking into a gentle smile. “I am here.”

“An understatement,” she muttered beneath her breath, then watched him hoist himself up against the headboard. He seemed to dominate not only the bed but the entire room. In turn, Leslie's eyes held dismay. “He really did it.”

Her reference was clear. “Your brother? Of course he did it. It sounds like he adores you. Most likely he'd have given you
anything
you'd asked.”

“But … a man?
You?
” Her dismay was fast turning to mortification. “I was supposed to be here alone,” she said in a very small voice. Above and beyond all the special things she had planned for herself, she suddenly realized that this man was not only gorgeous, but he was a male model who was
paid
to be pleasing to women. In this case he'd been paid by her brother,
her own brother
, to spend the week with her! Her cheeks felt hotter than ever.