Against All Odds (Arabesque) (5 page)

“Would you have enjoyed it as much if you hadn’t been with me?” She looked up at him just before a quip bounced off of her tongue. She’d never seen a more serious face, but she had to pretend that he was teasing her.

“I doubt it,” she joked, “you’re heady stuff.”

“Be careful,” he warned her, still serious. “I’m a man who demands evidence of
everything.
If I’m heady stuff, you’re one hell of an actress.” His remark stunned her, but she recovered quickly.

“Oh, I’ve been in a drama or two. Back in grade school, it’s true, but I was good.” Laughter rumbled in his throat, and he stroked her fingers and told her, “You’re one classy lady.”

* * *

Melissa looked around her as they continued walking down the aisle of the large church toward the massive baroque front door and marveled that every ethnic group and subgroup seemed to be represented there. She stopped walking to get Adam’s full attention. “Why is it,” she asked him, “that races and nationalities can sing together, play football, basketball, tennis and whatever together, go to school and church together, but as a group, they can’t get along? And they make love together—what’s more intimate than that? You’d think if they can do that, they can do anything together.”

“But that’s behind closed doors,” he explained. “Two people can resolve most anything if there’s nobody around but them, nobody to judge them or to influence them. Take us, for instance. Once our folks get wind of our spending time together, you’ll see how easily a third person can put a monkey wrench in a relationship.”

* * *

Melissa quickened her steps to match those of the man beside her. He must have noticed it, because he slowed his walk. Warmth and contentment suffused her, and when he folded her hand in his, she couldn’t make herself remove it. Was the peace that seemed to envelop her the quiet before a storm? She couldn’t remember ever having felt so carefree or so comfortable with anyone. Adam was honorable, she knew it deep down. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t leave her to cope alone with the problems that they both knew loomed ahead if they continued to see each other.

As if he’d read her thoughts, he asked her, “Would your family be angry with you if they knew we spent time together?”

Looking into the distance, she nodded. “I’d say that’s incontestable. Furor would be a better description of my father’s reaction.” She tried to lift her sagging spirits—only moments earlier they had soared with the pleasure of just being with him. He released her hand to hail a speeding taxi, and didn’t take it again. She sat against the door on her side of the cab.

With a wry smile, Adam commented, “If you sat any farther away from me, you’d be outside this cab. Scared?”

She gave him what she intended to be a withering look. “Of whom?”

“Well, if you’re so sure of yourself,” he baited, “slide over here.”

“I read the story of ‘Little Red Riding Hood,’” she told him solemnly, careful to maintain a straight face.

“Are you calling me a wolf?”

She was, she realized—and though he probably didn’t deserve it, she refused to recant. “You used that word. I didn’t. But I bet you’d be right at home in a wilderness.” Or most other places, she thought.

She controlled the urge to lean into him, when his long fingers stroked the back of her neck. “Don’t you know that men tend to behave the way women expect them to? Huh? Be careful, Melissa. I can howl with the best of them.” Tremors of excitement streaked through her. What would he be like if he dropped his starched facade?

“What does it take to get you started?” she asked idly, voicing a private thought.

“One spark of encouragement from you.” He flicked his thumb and forefinger. “Just that much, honey.” She couldn’t muffle the gasp that betrayed her.

“Move over here,” he taunted. “Come on. See for yourself.” Tempting. Seductive. Enticing her. The words dripping off of his smooth tongue in an invitation to madness. She clutched the door handle and prayed that he wouldn’t touch her.

“Melissa.”

She clasped her forearms tightly. “I’m happy right where I am.” Her heart skittered at his suggestive, rippling laughter.

“You’d be a lot happier,” he mocked, “if you closed this space between us.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Believe me, honey,” he purred, “I’m doing exactly that.” If she didn’t control the impulse, her fingers would find his and cling.

He took her key to open her door for her and held it as though weighing the consequences of alternative courses of action. After a few minutes during which he said nothing and she was forced to look into his mesmeric eyes while she fought rising desire, she had the impulse to tell him to do whatever he wanted—just get on with it. But seemingly against his will, as if he pulled it out of himself, he spoke.

“I’d like to spend some time with you, Melissa. I don’t have loose strings in my personal life nor in my business affairs. I need to see whether our friendship, or whatever it is that prevents our staying away from each other, will lead anywhere. I’m not asking for a commitment, and I’m not giving one. But there’s something special going on between us, and you know it, too. What do you say?”

“We’ll see.” Even if she hadn’t already learned a lesson, she had good cause to stay away from Adam. The most optimistic person wouldn’t give a romance between them a chance of maturing, because no matter how they felt about each other, their families’ reactions would count for more. So that settled it—she wouldn’t see him except with regard to business. But how could she be content not knowing what he’d be like if she let herself go and succumbed to whatever it was that dragged her toward him? Oh, Lord! Was she losing sight of the storm that awaited her when Rafer Grant learned of her passion for Adam Roundtree?

* * *

Adam awakened early the next morning after a sound and refreshing sleep. He’d made up his mind about Melissa, and as usual he didn’t fight a war with himself about his decision. That was behind him. He suspected that given the chance, she’d wrestle with it as any thinking person in her circumstances would, but he didn’t plan to give her much of a chance.

He scrambled out of bed as the first streaks of red and blue signaled the breaking dawn, showered, poured coffee from his automatic coffee maker, got a banana, and settled down to work. He liked Saturday mornings, because he was free to work on his charities, the projects whose success gave him the most pleasure. The Refuge, as the Rachel Hood Hayes Center for Women that was situated in Frederick was commonly known, had become overcrowded. He had to find a way to enlarge it and expand its services. His dilemma was whether to continue financing it himself or seek collaborative funds. If it were located in New York City or even Baltimore rather than Frederick, raising the money would be fairly simple, but corporations wouldn’t get substantial returns from humanitarian investments in Frederick, and he couldn’t count on their support.

He looked out of the window across Broadway and toward the Hudson River, knowing that he wouldn’t see Melissa’s building. He had had years of impersonal relationships and loveless sex, and he had long since tired of it. After the humiliation of that one innocent adolescent attachment, he’d sworn never to be vulnerable to another woman. The lovers he’d had as a man had wanted to be linked with Adam Roundtree and regarded intimacy as a part of that. They hadn’t attempted to know or understand him. Hadn’t cared whether he could hurt or be disappointed. Hadn’t dreamed that a hole within him cried out for a woman’s love and caring. But Melissa was different. He sensed it. He knew it. He pondered what his mother would think of Melissa. She’d probably find reasons to shun her, he mused, and none of them would have anything to do with Melissa herself. Mary Hayes Roundtree was bitterly opposed to the Morris/Grant people for having vilified her family’s name without cause. And he suspected that Melissa’s fair complexion might bother her, too—his mother liked to trace her roots back to Africa, and she ignored all the evidence of miscegenation that he could see in the Hayes family. A muscle twitched in his jaw. He couldn’t and wouldn’t allow his mother’s preferences and prejudices to influence his life.

He spent an hour on his personal accounts, then lifted the receiver and dialed her number.

“Hi. I mean, hello.”

He could barely understand the mumbled words. “Hi. Sorry to wake you, but I’ve been up for hours. Want to go bike riding?”

“Biking?” The sound resembled a lusty purr, and he could almost see her stretching languorously, seductively. “Call me back in a couple of days.”

“Come on, sleepyhead, get up. Life’s passing you by.”

“Hmm. Who is this?” He had a sudden urge to be there, leaning over her, watching her relaxed and inviting, seeing her soft and yielding without her defenses. Her deep sigh warned him that she was about to drop the receiver.

“This is Adam.” He heard her feet hit the floor as she jumped up.

“Who? Adam? Bicycle?” A long pause ensued. “Adam, who would have thought you were sadistic?”

“I didn’t know I was. Want to ride with me? Come on. Meet me at the bike shop in an hour.”

“Where is it?”

“Not far from you. Broadway at Sixty-fifth Street. Eat something.”

“Okay.”

They rode leisurely around Central Park, greeting the few bikers and joggers they encountered in the still cool morning. Melissa knew a rare release, an unfamiliar absence of concerns. It was as if she had shed an outer skin that she hadn’t known to be confining but the loss of which had gained her a welcomed freedom. She looked over at the man who rode beside her, at his dark muscular legs and thighs glistening with faint perspiration from their hour’s ride and at the powerful arms that guided the bike with such ease. From her limited experience, she had always believed that it was the man who wanted and who asked. She shook her head, wondering whether she was strange, decided that she wasn’t, and let a grin crease her cheeks. Self-revelation could be pleasant.

* * *

“Let me in on it. What’s funny?”

“Me.” She replied and refused to elaborate, watching him from the corner of her right eye. He slowed their pace and headed them toward the lake. At the shed he locked and stored their bikes and rented a canoe for them. He rowed near the edge of the lake. The ducks made place for them amidst the water lilies, and some swam alongside the canoe, quacking, seemingly happy to provide entertainment. Melissa looked around them and saw that, except for the birds, they were alone. The cool, fresh morning breeze pressed her shirt to her skin, and she lowered her head in embarrassment when she realized he could see the pointed tips of her breasts. Her restless squirming seemed to intensify his fixation with her, and she had to employ enormous self-control to resist covering her breasts with her arm.

“Don’t be shy,” he soothed, “let me look at you. I’ve never before seen you so relaxed, so carefree.”

“If you saw it all the time, you’d soon be fed up with it,” she jested in embarrassment. “And maybe worse. One Latin poet, I believe his name was Plautus, said that anything in excess brings trouble.”

His half smile quickened the twinkle of his eyes, and her hands clutched her chest as frissons of heat raced through her. “I prefer Mae West’s philosophy,” he taunted. “She said too much of a good thing is wonderful. You stick with Mister What’s-his-name’s view.” Melissa stared at him. Did he know what he’d just done to her?

His eyes caressed her while she squirmed, rubbed her arms, and moistened her lips. As though enchanted, he dropped anchor and let the boat idle.

“You’re too far away from me. If I wasn’t sure this thing would capsize, I’d go down there and get you.”

“And do what?” she challenged. Heat seemed to radiate from him, and she shivered in excited anticipation.

“When I finished, you’d never think of another man. You know you’re playing with fire, don’t you?” She wrinkled her nose in disdain.

“Keep it up,” he growled, “and I’ll go down there to you even if this thing sinks.” The air crackled and sizzled around them, and she fought the feminine heat that stirred in her loins. Sweat poured down her face as his hot gaze singed her, but she struggled to summon a posture of indifference. Nose tilted upward and chin thrust forward, she teased him, her voice unsteady.

“Planning to rock the boat, are you? Well, if you let me drown, the Morrises and Grants will have your head.”

She thrilled from head to toe as his laughter washed over her, exciting her. “I’m scared to death, Melissa. I’m shaking in my Reeboks.” Her right hand dipped into the lake as a duck swam by, and she brought up enough water to wet the front of his shirt.

“Lady, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Cooling you off.” She hoped she’d made him give her some room. She hadn’t. He looked at her steadily and spoke without a trace of humor.

“If you think I’m hot now, Melissa, you’re in for a big surprise.”

* * *

Adam watched as her eyes widened and knew she was at a loss as to how to handle him. He regretted that—he wanted her to handle him and to enjoy doing it. He pulled up the anchor and began rowing. The trees heavy with green leaves and the quiet water provided the perfect background against which he could appreciate her beguiling loveliness. His fingers itched to replace the breeze that gently lifted her hair from her shoulders and neck, and his lips burned with the impulse to taste her throat, to... They had the lake to themselves. If he dared... He raised his gaze from the water surrounding them and caught the naked passion unsheltered in her eyes. Watched, flabbergasted, as she licked her lips. Desire sliced through him, and he had to fight to rein in his rampant passion.

He rowed back to the shed, surrendered their boat, and retrieved their bikes. He was in control, he assured himself. He could stop the relationship, walk away from it anytime he chose. Or he could have until he’d seen the heat in her eyes and the quivering of her lips—for him.

* * *

He stood in front of the building in which she lived, looking down at her, trying to keep his hands to himself. She squinted at him and licked her lips. Did she want him to...? He ran his fingers over his short hair in frustration.