Kitabı oku: «Bride On Loan»

CHAPTER ONE

THE calendar said it was Halloween, but Sabrina Saunders thought it felt more like the middle of March. The gray sky, pale daylight, low roiling clouds and howling wind made her think of the Arctic Circle in winter, not Denver on an October afternoon.

As she started to get out of her car, a gust caught at the convertible’s door and slammed it against her shin. Sabrina winced in pain and paused to examine the leg of her silk trousers. Seeing that the edge of the door had hit hard enough to leave a streak of street dirt on the emerald-green fabric, she decided she didn’t want to look at the damage underneath. There wasn’t much she could do about it just now anyway.

She knelt on the driver’s seat, propping the door open with one foot, as she dragged a couple of long, lightweight garment bags from the tiny back seat. The breeze whipped the flimsy plastic, and she tugged it away from her face as she hurried up the ramp at the front of the little bungalow to ring the bell. “Come on, Paige,” she muttered as she waited, wishing she hadn’t left her scarf and gloves in the car.

The door swung open, and Sabrina looked down at a white-haired woman sitting in a wheelchair. “Hi, Eileen,” she said. “I brought Paige her Halloween costume for the party tonight. Is she here?”

Eileen McDermott didn’t answer, just backed her chair out of the way, looked over her shoulder and called her daughter’s name. Then she fixed her chilly gaze on Sabrina and said, “I do hope you’re planning to close that door. I’ve already got a sore throat.”

Sabrina bit her tongue to keep from saying how much she was enjoying the frigid air and finished untangling the end of one of the garment bags from the latch so she could close the door. “I’m sorry to hear you’re feeling ill again, Eileen.”

“I suppose I’m as well as can be expected,” Eileen said with a long-suffering air.

Paige McDermott came around the corner from the kitchen, checkbook and pen in hand. “You’re running a bit late, aren’t you, Sabrina?”

“Just a smidge. Nothing I can’t make up. And it was worth it, Paige, because look what I found today.” Sabrina pulled up one of the plastic bags to show off the garment that hung underneath.

Eileen sounded as if she’d swallowed a lemon. “You can’t mean that you chose that for Paige to wear at a children’s party!”

Sabrina raised her eyebrows and looked thoughtfully from Eileen to the skimpy bit of midnight blue satin and lace she was holding at arm’s length. “As a matter of fact,” she said, “I think with her coloring she’d look lovely in it. If we team it up with some mesh stockings and very high heels, and maybe add a little ribbon tied around the neck—”

“Don’t forget a long flannel bathrobe to cover up the goose bumps,” Paige added.

“Made of a Scottish plaid, no doubt.” Sabrina sighed. “Paige, do you have no sense of adventure? No romance in your soul?”

“Not a speck,” Paige said firmly.

Sabrina ignored the interruption. “You’d look grand in a satin teddy, and if the right guy was around you wouldn’t have to worry about goose bumps, either.”

Eileen snorted. “That’s the kind of remark I’d expect from Cassie, not you. Now that she’s gone all starry-eyed about that…that—”

“I believe the word you’re looking for may be man,” Sabrina said innocently. “As a matter of fact, this bit of finery isn’t for Paige. I bought it for Cassie. Saturday’s her bridal shower, and I thought she’d rather have something like this than another casserole dish or set of tea towels.”

“And since you just happened to see it on the clearance rack as you were walking through Milady Lingerie…” Paige murmured.

“Well, not exactly. At least, it wasn’t on sale. But wait till you see what I did find on the clearance—” Sabrina stopped. “Hey, if you’re implying I was goofing off, Paige, I wasn’t. But Milady’s right across the mall from the costume place, and I had to wait while they adjusted the tail on my cat suit.”

Paige laughed. “And given a choice between killing time looking at lingerie or trying on clown noses—”

“I’ll take lace and satin any day,” Sabrina agreed.

Paige gave a tug to the other garment bag and glanced without apparent interest at the contents. “At least it isn’t lace and satin,” she said. “But I still don’t see why we have to dress up for this. It’s not like we’re part of the party, we’re just running the thing.”

“Because we won’t look so out of place if we’re in costume. And it’ll be more fun for the kids that way. They love it when adults make fools of themselves.”

“No doubt,” Paige muttered darkly. “Personally, I wouldn’t mind dressing as the party organizer. Jeans, sweatshirt, running shoes and clipboard are my idea of a great costume.”

Sabrina grinned. “Hey, be grateful I didn’t call you All Hallows’ Eve and deck you out in fig leaves and apples.”

“I’ll remember that,” Paige said. “Mother, are you absolutely certain you don’t want to go to the party at the senior center tonight instead of staying here alone? I can drop you off, and they’ll make sure you have transportation home even if I’m late. It would be much more fun—”

“If you’re worried about my safety, Paige, I certainly have no intention of opening the door to the sort of little hoodlums who are likely to come trick-or-treating. I’ll just sit here with the lamps turned off, with my book and a flashlight, and they’ll never know I’m home at all.”

Sabrina wanted to roll her eyes. Sitting alone in the dark seemed to her to be one of Eileen’s favorite pastimes—especially if there was a chance of making Paige feel guilty about it.

“Now if you wouldn’t mind finding my cough drops, Paige,” Eileen said.

“Is your throat worse, Mother?”

“I don’t think so.” Eileen’s tone, in contrast to her words, was full of doubt. “Though if you could see your way clear not to go out tonight…Cassie will be there to help with the party, won’t she?”

Sabrina nodded. “But it’ll take all three of us just to oversee the people I’ve hired.”

“I thought this was going to be a small party,” Eileen said. “Just a little entertainment for the staff’s children, to keep them off the streets on Halloween night.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” Sabrina agreed. “But then it grew into a celebration for everybody at Tanner Electronics.”

“That’s because Caleb Tanner’s bimbo of the week got hold of the idea,” Paige explained.

“At least she’s not expecting us to arrange all the entertainment for the adults.” Sabrina wrinkled her nose at the memory. “But since it looks as if her festivity’s going to last all night, I decided it might be prudent to hire a couple of baby-sitters for each age group, to take the kids off and entertain them while their parents party.”

“It breaks my heart, Paige,” Eileen said mournfully, “the sort of people you’re being exposed to.”

She sounded, Sabrina thought, as if she believed her daughter was still an impressionable preteen. “And there’s an amazing age range on these kids,” she went on, “so the number of sitters required—”

“Besides, there’s not only a range, there’s a lot of kids,” Paige said. “For what was represented to us as a bunch of nerds with nothing on their minds but work, the crew at Tanner Electronics have an awful lot of offspring.”

“Which is why it’ll take all hands to manage the party, Eileen. And right now,” Sabrina added, “though she means well and she tries hard, the fact is that Cassie doesn’t have eyes for anything but Jake, so she’s going to be of minimal—”

“That’ll wear off soon enough.” Eileen’s tone was chilly. “The tunnel vision, I mean. And obscene bits of underwear won’t delay the process by much, either.”

Obscene? The teddy was certainly suggestive, Sabrina thought. It was even a trifle naughty—that was the whole point of honeymoon lingerie, after all. But it was hardly obscene.

Sabrina couldn’t stop herself. She draped the teddy across the arm of Eileen’s wheelchair so the woman couldn’t avoid an up-close view while she painstakingly retied a blue satin ribbon, located at the bikini line, which had come undone. “I don’t suppose you’d like to tell us exactly how you know all that,” she said innocently as she held up the teddy once more.

Paige intervened hastily. “If you’re going to get everything done in time, Sabrina, hadn’t you better be going? I’ll be along just as soon as I can.”

“Perhaps you’d better go right now, Paige,” Eileen said. Her voice was grim. “There’s no telling what Sabrina could accomplish if she’s left to herself—she could bring down the whole business that you’ve worked so hard to build.”

“It is true,” Paige said judiciously, “now that Rent-A-Wife has landed a client like Caleb Tanner, we’d be wise to avoid offending him. But I’m sure Sabrina already—”

Sabrina gave her a sunny smile. “Oh, well, if not offending Caleb Tanner is the goal,” she said gently, “then you really had better wear the teddy!”

The atrium lobby at Tanner Electronics was brightly lit and bustling; Sabrina noted that Cassie’s crew of volunteers had been busy, for most of the decorations they’d selected were already in place. Fake spiderwebs, bats hung on threads and a scarecrow-like witch in the corner all looked a bit obvious at the moment, but when night settled in and the lights were turned down, the effect would be appropriately spooky.

Not as good as a true haunted house, of course, Sabrina thought regretfully. But in the year since she and Paige and Cassie had combined forces to start Rent-A-Wife, they’d learned to work within all kinds of restrictions. And since this was the first good-size job they’d done for Tanner Electronics, it was more important, Paige had said, to pull off a simple, nice event that stayed well within the budget than it was to blow Caleb Tanner’s socks off with an expensive gala.

At the time, Sabrina had agreed, but after her first encounter with Caleb’s bimbo of the week, she’d had a change of heart. It was more likely, it seemed to her, that anything Rent-A-Wife came up with would look anemic to a man who was used to the celebrations thrown by a woman who obviously had no hesitation about spending his bank balance.

But Paige was right; there was quite a difference between the two situations. And it was too late for modifications now. They’d just have to impress Caleb the old-fashioned way.

Though it was an hour till the start of the party, Sabrina changed into her sleek black cat costume in the ladies’ lounge before she started to fill the dozens of black and orange helium balloons that would finish off the atrium’s decor. She knew from experience how easily time slipped by when she was busy and how hard it was to break away from a half-finished task, with party pressure already under way, to change clothes. This way, if the kids started arriving before she was finished, they’d think that helping blow up balloons was simply part of the planned entertainment.

Pumping helium into what seemed to be a million individual balloons was not Sabrina’s idea of high enjoyment. By the time the first hundred were filled, tied and bobbing from a hook on the side of the rocket-shaped helium tank, she was reminding herself that the occasional tedium of her job was more than offset by the daily advantages of flexibility, frequent change and lack of pressure.

By the time the second hundred were finished, she was regretting that she hadn’t kept her coat handy; the delivery company had left the helium tank right inside the main door, and every time an employee or visitor came in or out, Sabrina got a blast of chilly air. But since the tank was almost as tall as she was, at least twice as heavy and awkward to boot, she didn’t have the option of moving it.

“At this rate,” she mused, “even Eileen will have to concede me the title of sore-throat queen.”

She decided to take a break from filling and started to untangle the blown-up balloons from the hook on the side of the tank; she’d tie them into clusters so as soon as Paige showed up she could start placing them strategically around the atrium to complete the decorations.

And just where was Paige, anyway, she wondered. Kids in costumes were going to start drifting in at any minute.

Sabrina counted out fifteen balloons and began tugging them free from the anchoring hook on the side of the tank, intending to haul them out of the draft from the doorway so she could work more easily.

Her attention was focused on untangling the balloon strings, and when one unexpectedly gave way Sabrina took an unplanned step backward, directly into the doorway. Directly into a brick pillar—or at least that’s what it felt like to Sabrina. Only there weren’t any brick pillars in the atrium—and even if there had been, brick pillars didn’t swear.

The impact jolted her, and fifteen orange and black balloons soared free from her grip and bounded to the high ceiling. Short of driving a fire-department snorkel truck into the building, Sabrina bet they’d stay up there till they withered with age. “Now look what you’ve done,” she said, and turned to face the object she’d collided with.

He was a big man, lean but broad-shouldered and a couple of inches over six feet. His size seemed to be magnified by his attire—a close-fitting black-and-silver motorcycle suit, complete with a dark-visored helmet, which completely hid his face.

“Nice costume,” she said almost automatically. “But you’re a bit early. The kids’ party won’t actually start for half an hour or so, and the adult version won’t get rolling till—”

“I’m not here for the party.” His voice wasn’t much more than a growl. Or was she hearing the effect of the helmet?

“You mean you always go around looking like a cross between Don Quixote and a Hell’s Angel?”

“I mean I was merely walking in with an armload of mail when I got tackled by—of all things—an ill-mannered cat.”

“You’d better be referring to my outfit,” Sabrina said pleasantly. “Because if you’re accusing me personally of being an ill-mannered cat—”

“I’m not the one who called you Don Quixote.”

Interesting, Sabrina thought. It almost sounded like he’d taken the Hell’s Angel part as a compliment.

“Just look at the mess you made.” He waved a black-gloved hand at the floor.

Sabrina looked down. What would have been a respectable pile of envelopes, catalogs and folders, probably a hundred in all, had scattered like a shotgun blast across the granite floor, some skittering as much as ten feet across the slick stone. “I’ll admit to being a bit clumsy,” she said. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t see you, but you must have noticed me. And you could have walked around me, you know.”

“How? You’re right in the middle of the doorway, as much in the way as it’s possible to be. Can’t that project be done somewhere else?”

“It could,” Sabrina said, “if the delivery company hadn’t planted the tank right here.”

“It’s on wheels.”

“Yes, but wheels or not it’s too heavy for me to move. If you’d like to lend a hand—”

He moved quickly for a big man, Sabrina had to give him credit for that. So quickly, in fact, that before she’d even realized what he intended to do, he had seized the tank and tipped it back, nudging the wheels into motion with the toe of his boot.

The bunch of balloons she’d tied haphazardly to the hook on the side of the tank floated loose. Desperate not to see the rest of her work escape to the ceiling, Sabrina made a wild leap for the trailing strings.

Her foot hit one of the scattered envelopes, which slid like an ice skate across the smooth floor. She missed the balloons, and her shoulder hit the top of the tank and over-balanced it. All three of them—motorcyclist, tank and Sabrina—spun out of control and hit the polished granite.

The crash echoed around the atrium for what seemed hours.

Sabrina lay still for a long moment, trying to gather her wits and catch her breath, afraid to open her eyes. She’d hit the granite with only a glancing blow, she knew—probably because the motorcyclist’s body had broken her fall. But what about him? If, in addition to her, the tank had landed on him—

After the echo of the crash died, all she could hear at first was a faint hiss. Was that him, or had the valve on the helium tank ruptured at impact?

She rolled clear and sat up. The hissing stopped. Now he was groaning—but that was good, wasn’t it? At least he was alive, though it was hard to tell through the darkened visor of his helmet whether he was conscious or not.

Mixed with the groans, she began to make out words. He was conscious, she concluded. And—judging by his choice of vocabulary—he was not very happy. Well, she couldn’t exactly blame him for being upset.

His muttering was getting louder, she noted.

“Excuse me,” Sabrina said. “But the kids are starting to come in for this party, so if you could modify the language—”

He stopped talking for a moment, and even through the darkened visor there was no mistaking the glare he sent her way. “A bit clumsy?” he quoted grimly. “That’s what you call a bit clumsy?”

“Wait a minute. You’re not going to blame this on me when the whole thing was your fault.”

“Mine?” His voice was little short of a howl. “I didn’t knock over the damned tank!”

“If you’d just told me what you were planning to do, I could have gotten the balloons out of the way—and if you’d picked up the mail, my foot wouldn’t have slipped.”

“You mean, the mail you knocked on the floor in the first place.”

Sabrina bit her lip. She couldn’t exactly argue with that, so she decided it was safer to change the subject. “Here, I’ll help you up.”

“No, thanks. I’ll get myself off the—” He shifted position as if to sit up and let out a yell of pain, twisting his body so he could clap both hands to his right knee. “I can’t get up.”

Sabrina felt the blood drain out of her face. She looked wildly around for help.

Though it felt like forever, it could only have been moments since the accident, for just now were people starting to cluster around them. A man moved through the crowd, edging between onlookers until he reached the center of attention and knelt next to the motorcyclist, and Sabrina loosed a sigh of relief at the sight of Cassie’s fiancé.

Jake Abbott shot a questioning look at Sabrina as he reached down to release the chin strap on the motorcyclist’s helmet. “What happened this time, Sabrina?”

“What do you mean, this time?” the motorcyclist said as Jake pulled his helmet loose.

Sabrina got her first good look at his face, but it didn’t tell her much. He looked vaguely familiar, and she thought that under normal circumstances he’d probably be quite good-looking. A lock of dark brown hair tumbled engagingly over his forehead, and any woman who needed mascara would have killed for his eyelashes—long, thick, dark and curly.

Of course, at the moment it was hard to tell, because the man’s face was twisted in pain and sweat had broken out in big drops on his forehead.

“Is she in the habit of assaulting perfectly innocent bystanders?” he demanded.

Sabrina ignored him. “Thank heaven you’re here, Jake,” she said. “He fell, and—”

The man on the floor spoke through clenched teeth. “I did not fall,” he said grimly. “Cat Woman there knocked me down. She’s a menace—I think she’s broken my knee.”

“Let’s not leap to conclusions, Caleb,” Jake said. He released the zipper at the motorcyclist’s ankle and gently folded back the tight-fitting suit.

Caleb, Jake had said.

Sabrina’s gaze flew to the motorcyclist’s face. Now that she’d heard his name and knew what to look for, she could see him more clearly. Sure enough, under the pain-twisted expression lay the handsome features of Denver’s most famous entrepreneur.

Of all the people in the world she could have collided with, Sabrina had flattened Caleb Tanner. Electronics wizard, playboy millionaire…brand-new client.

Stunned, Sabrina stared at his exposed knee. The flesh was already so puffy it was no wonder he couldn’t bend it. And much as she tried to convince herself she was seeing a shadow, she couldn’t honestly deny that the joint was already bruising, as well.

In fact, his knee was starting to resemble one of the multitude of black helium balloons that were now cheerfully bouncing against the ceiling.

Her stomach felt queasy. What was it she’d been thinking just an hour ago, about impressing Caleb Tanner?

Well, Sabrina told herself gloomily, it looked as if she’d impressed him, all right. In all the wrong ways.

Sabrina was still sitting cross-legged, almost stunned, on the cold granite floor when the paramedics came. She watched as they worked over Caleb, and for a moment, she hardly noticed the petite redhead in a milkmaid’s outfit who stooped over her, holding out a headband to which a set of cat ears had been attached. The ears looked as if they’d been stepped on.

With a sigh, Sabrina reached up to take the ears, raising her gaze to her partner. “Thanks, Cassie. I hadn’t even realized they were gone. They must have gone flying when I hit the floor.” She poked the headband approximately into place atop her head.

Cassie pulled it loose again and turned it so the ears faced properly forward. “Are you okay? The ambulance crew is about ready to transport Caleb, but maybe they should take a look at you before they leave. Did you hit your head?”

“No. At least I don’t think so. Oh, Cassie—Paige is going to kill me for this.”

“For what? Assaulting a brand-new client? She won’t if I have anything to say about it.”

“You’re a love, Cassie.”

“Because I’m going to get you first,” Cassie said lightly. “After all I went through to land this account, you treat the boss like a punching bag….”

Sabrina felt tears sting her eyelids.

“Hey, I’m teasing,” Cassie said hastily. “In the first place, you obviously didn’t do it on purpose.”

“He thinks I did.”

“Sabrina, a man who’s in pain always looks for someone to blame.”

The paramedics elevated the gurney in preparation for rolling it out to the ambulance, and the crowd shifted and moved back to give them room.

Sabrina’s conscience nagged till she caught Jake’s eye and offered reluctantly, “Should I come along? Since I know exactly what happened—”

Caleb raised a hand in a commanding gesture. “Don’t you dare let her, Jake. If that woman gets into the ambulance, I’ll walk to the hospital.”

Sabrina felt like sticking her tongue out at him, but there wasn’t much point; he wasn’t in a position to see because the gurney was already rolling toward the door.

A small boy who was standing nearby, wearing a super-hero costume, said, “Where’s the blood? Isn’t there going to be blood?” Disappointment dripped from his voice.

The door opened, and a whoosh of cold air surrounded Sabrina. Wearily, she forced herself to stand. The chilly granite had left her feeling stiff and sore, and for a moment she wondered if she should have let the paramedics look her over.

From the doorway came a feminine shriek. Only half-curious, Sabrina turned to look.

A princess in long, flowing robes and a faux medieval headdress was blocking the door, hands pressed to her mouth, staring at Caleb in horror. “What happened, darling?”

His tone was dismissive. “Just an accident, Angelique. Nothing for you to have hysterics over.”

“Figures,” Sabrina muttered. “For her, he’s brave and manly. A couple of minutes ago you’d have thought he was barely hanging on to life.”

“There’s no need for you to miss your party, Angelique,” Caleb said.

“The party? Darling, surely you don’t think I could possibly stay here and have fun while you’re in agony!”

Beside Sabrina, Cassie muttered, “She will if she knows what’s good for her.”

The princess seized Caleb’s hand as if she was daring anyone to remove her from his side. The gurney started to roll again, and she walked alongside.

“I don’t need to be fussed over,” Caleb was saying as the door closed behind them.

“Whew,” Cassie said. “My guess is that will be the final straw. Angelique’s time as bimbo of the week has just expired. Of course, it may take her a while to realize it, but—”

Sabrina frowned. “How do you know that?”

“Didn’t you see the way he looked at her when he said she didn’t need to have hysterics?”

“Yeah, I saw. It looked pretty mild compared to the way he’d been looking at me. It’s my opinion you’re suffering from wishful thinking, Cassie. Just because you don’t like Angelique…” Sabrina sighed. “And I thought the biggest problem I was going to face tonight was having to apologize to Paige for baiting Eileen about your bridal shower gift.”

Cassie opened her mouth, then obviously thought better of the question. “Let’s get the party started,” she said instead. “What’s first? Bobbing for apples?”

Sabrina looked at the house, then at the number scrawled on the square of paper clipped to the convertible’s visor. The address agreed, there was no doubt of that. But had she written it down wrong? The last place she’d have expected the playboy millionaire to live was in a neighborhood that had long since passed its prime.

In the strong morning sunlight, the three-story colonial revival house looked nothing short of dilapidated. Its white paint was alligatored; one faded green shutter hung at a tired angle and another was gone altogether. The railing on the small balcony above the pillared front porch was missing half a dozen balusters, and one of the pair of chimneys looked as if it could benefit from a serious tuck-pointing.

As she looked at the address again, however, a truck pulled into the semicircular driveway and parked directly before the front door. Two uniformed men climbed out, and a moment later they began unloading what looked like a hospital bed.

Yeah, Sabrina told herself. Unlikely as it seemed, she had the right place after all.

She squared her shoulders and gathered up a small, bright-colored shopping bag and a sheaf of fresh fall flowers wrapped in cellophane. Caleb Tanner would probably throw the contents of the bag in her face and use the sharp flower stems to defend himself, she thought gloomily. But she had to make the effort. Whether he was likely to accept her apology wasn’t the point; she still had to offer it.

She followed the bed to the front door and up two steps onto a crumbling concrete porch. The door stood wide open; a small, fussy-looking elderly man was just inside, giving directions to the delivery men.

The bed crossed the wide hallway and stopped while the men debated how to make it fit through a too-narrow door. They tipped it on one side and pushed; a rail scraped the door molding, and the little man held his breath until the delivery men set the bed down and stood back to scratch their heads and consider.

From the doorway on the other side of the hall, opposite the room where the bed was noisily being set up, a familiar feminine voice cooed. “Darling, are you absolutely certain there isn’t anything I can do to make you more comfortable?”

Angelique, Sabrina thought. Cassie had been wrong; the bimbo’s time in the sun obviously hadn’t expired just yet.

Sabrina edged closer and peeked around the corner of the doorway. Beyond it lay a large living room with a high-beamed ceiling, two sets of French doors and a fireplace where a blaze crackled cheerfully. Over the back of a black leather couch, which sat directly in front of the fire, she could see just the top of Caleb’s head.

Next to him, perched on the edge of the couch cushions, was Angelique. “If you’re certain,” she said, and leaned against him for an obviously intimate embrace.

Sabrina drew back into the hallway and debated her next move. Fortunately, the little man was too absorbed in watching the delivery crew to ask what she wanted.

Before Sabrina had made up her mind what to do, Angelique appeared in the doorway. “What are you doing here?” she asked suspiciously, eying Sabrina. “Not that it matters. Mr. Tanner is resting, so you’ll have to go away. Jennings, take the things this woman has brought and see her out. I have an errand to run, but I’ll be back in an hour to see how our invalid is doing.”