Damon, Lee (27 page)

"Good heavens, O'Mara, you could hole up in here for

weeks. Are you one of those writers who hibernates when the creative urge hits?"

"Not really, although it's handy for snacks and coffee at odd hours. This wing was designed as an apartment for the original owner's aunt. Open that door on the other side of the kitchen. Go on. That was the living room, but I've made it into a library. What do you think?"

"It's beautiful," gasped Kitt, taking in the casual elegance of the room. Somehow, she knew that O'Mara had arranged this room, just as he had the others, and she was more than a little surprised at the many facets of his taste she was seeing in this fascinating house. Where the other rooms had been designed for a combination of comfortable living and hard use by active youngsters or a busy man, this room was obviously intended for quiet contemplation and study. The long inner wall was centered by a small fireplace of green-veined black marble with intricately carved wood panels rising above it to the ceiling. On both sides, the wall was lined with floor-to-ceiling bookcases except for the doors at either end. The outer end-wall contained a door to the outside and a wide window framing a pretty rock garden with a path winding through it between the door and the courtyard. The chairs and sofas, which were arranged in casual groupings by the fireplace and the big bay window, were of a traditional, faintly Victorian styling and were upholstered in jewel-toned Belgian cut-velvet, which somehow managed to blend rather than clash with the soft creams, blues and greens of an almost-room-sized antique Oriental rug.

O'Mara watched Kitt's bemused face as she looked around the lovely room and smiled to himself with considerable satisfaction. Taking her hand, he pulled her toward the door leading back to the main house, saying softly, "I think we've found you your own special place."

"Oh, yes. It's... is that a Pembroke table? And that looks like Hepplewhite."

"They are. We'll come back and you can look to your heart's content later. Right now, I want to get upstairs before that sunset gets away from us."

They were halfway up the curving staircase when the phone rang, and Andy, pausing in the hall to answer it, called up, "It's for you, Michael."

"Will you take a message and tell them I'll call back shortly, please?"

"Michael... it's a woman.... She says she's Mrs. O'Mara."

Chapter 15

Kitt swayed and groped for the banister as shock blasted through her with icy numbness. Dimly, she heard Gus's mutter of "What's
she
want?" and O'Mara's snarled expletive, and then O'Mara's hands were on her shoulders pushing her down to sit on a stair.

"Kitt! Don't look like that, love. It's only Laura doing her best to cause trouble. Look, you go on up with Gus while I get rid of her, and I'll explain later. Kitt?"

She blinked and shook her head as if she were coming out of sleep, then focused her gaze on his concerned expression. For a long minute, they looked at each other, and then, as she felt the reassurance emanating from him, she gradually relaxed. A pressure against her side and the feel of a thin arm sliding around her waist brought her head around, and she discovered Gus sitting beside her and patting her arm, his face mirroring his father's concern.

"It's okay, Kitt. We're not going to let her bother you. She's just trying to twist Dad's arm to get money." The young voice was very matter-of-fact, as if he were discussing the distasteful antics of a stranger. And, really, that's just what he's doing, thought Kitt as she put her arm around his shoulders and hugged him. He's never seen her, and he's so smart that he must know she doesn't give a damn. Oh, I'd like to shake her teeth loose! No, I'd like to send her somewhere far away where she can't ever upset him again. She'd be a rotten mother, obviously, and he's done far better without her.

"Kitt? Are you all right?"

"Yes." Her voice was strong and very positive. "I'm fine.

Go talk to her while Gus shows me his room. Go on, now, we're going to be too late for the sunset if you dawdle around here. Come on, Gus. Where's Hero?"

As she and Gus reached the top of the stairs, she could hear O'Mara's voice, full of barely controlled fury, echoing up the stairwell. She had the fleeting thought that she was just as happy not to be on the receiving end of
that
before she turned her attention to her surroundings. The upper hall was lit by a pair of sliding glass doors that opened out onto the captain's deck. At this moment, Gus only let her look out for a quick scan of the triangular area, floored with redwood decking and enclosed with a waist-high safety guard formed from panels of clear, inch-thick Lexan bolted to a strong metal framework.

"We'll go out in a couple of minutes when Dad gets here. Come this way, now, and see my room." Gus tugged on her hand eagerly, and she followed him along the hallway to the left and through the first door on the right. "Those are guest rooms and baths on the other side, but my room is here, then the baths, mine and Andy's, and then her room goes all the way to the end on this side. There. Isn't it great? It's double-sized and so's Andy's. And Dad's is even bigger. It's on the other side of the stairs."

"Wow! Oh, Gus, what a super room!" Kitt's surprised delight was genuine. The big room was a boy's dream, and the long expanse of windows running the full length of the outer wall and making the panorama of sea and sky seem like an extension of the room was the frosting on the cake. Kitt stood just inside the door, taking it all in as Gus darted around pointing out the major features: low, wide window seats that were also storage bins; rugged oak furniture with brass trim; inlaid vinyl tile floor in a geometric pattern of brown, orange and yellow softened with several thick, dark brown area rugs; a large section of built-in shelves including a swivel bracket for a small TV and fittings for a stereo rig, records, tapes, speakers and a recording setup; a workbench with model airplanes and cars displayed on the shelves above it; a large aquarium; and a large, fine-mesh cage sitting on its own table by the windows.

"Listen, Gus, since you've got an extra bed..." Kitt let her voice trail off suggestively and grinned at him.

"Oh, Kitt, you wouldn't fit in that bed." He chuckled. "It's for when I have a friend stay over. Besides, I think Dad has something else in mind for you." He broke up in laughter at the look of consternation on her face.

"Ahhh... I don't think you're supposed to understand that, are you?" she asked doubtfully.

"Well... we do talk about a lot of things that I don't think the other guys talk to their fathers about. Come see Fifi." He pulled her over to the cage, and she looked at him questioningly when she could see nothing but a collection of large, flattish rocks piled up rather haphazardly.

"Maybe it's a silly question, but why do you need this big cage to keep rocks in?"

"Watch." With a definite O'Mara gleam of devilry in his bright blue eyes, Gus started drumming his fingers on the top of the cage. After a few seconds, Kitt saw something moving between the rocks, then a quick blur of motion, and she was suddenly staring in frozen shock at a coiled rattlesnake, its head lifted and slightly weaving while its tongue darted in and out and its tail vibrated noisily. Instinctively, she grabbed Gus, pulling him back from the cage, and looked frantically around for Hero.

"Kitt! Kitt! It's okay. She's harmless." Between gusts of laughter he managed to get her attention, patting her arm in reassurance.

"Harmless? That's a rattlesnake!"

"Honest, Kitt, she's okay. She's been defanged. Ohhh, the look on your face." He went off into another peal of laughter.

"Gus! You didn't spring Fifi on her without any warning!" The deep voice was equally divided between chiding and laughter, and Kitt turned to find O'Mara striding across the room. "You handled that very well, love. Not even a scream. You should have heard Ez yell."

"And he jumped backward halfway across the room," said Gus, chortling.

The look Kitt split between them promised future retribution. "You, my darling toad, have been warping this otherwise delightful boy's sense of humor.
Fifi?"

Gus slanted a look up at his father and then gazed at Kitt in wide-eyed innocence. "It's 'cause she shakes her tail. Dad named her."

She tried but couldn't hold it back. She rocked with laughter and finally collapsed on the window seat, holding onto her aching ribs while tears ran down her face.

"I don't believe it," she moaned. "Ez must have loved it. Fifi!"

O'Mara reached for her hands and pulled her to her feet. "Come on out on the captain's deck. That sky's about right." He led her over to a sliding glass door at the end of the windows and out onto the deck.

Gus took her other hand and urged her over to the point of the triangle. "Isn't this something, Kitt? It's just like being on the prow of a ship."

"Unreal," breathed Kitt, pushing her blowing hair out of her face and looking out and down at the heaving ocean. Feeling O'Mara's arm around her waist, she leaned back against his shoulder and looked up at the color-streaked sky.

"Are you warm enough? The wind's coming up a bit," he said softly in her ear. "We can go down and watch this from the bridge if you're cold."

"I'm not going to be cold. Between you and my mini-O'Mara here," she chuckled, wrapping her arms around Gus and holding him in front of her, "I'm going to be warm as can be."

Watching the changing hues of the sunset, they stood quietly talking.

"This is a great spot for sunbathing," Kitt said a bit wistfully.

"Hmmm. With or without strap-marks and white patches," O'Mara murmured in her ear with an accompanying kiss. "No one can see you up here when you're lying on the deck, except from our own second-floor windows."

"Tempting thought."

Gus twisted his head around to look up at her. "We've got chairs and stuff we put out here in the summer, and when it's not too windy, we have picnics up here."

She turned her head to meet O'Mara's heated gaze and caught her breath at the vividness of the vision that flashed into her mind, a vignette of the two of them lying naked in the sun and sharing a picnic of wine and cheese. O'Mara's slow, knowing smile told her that he was reading her mind again, or perhaps this time she was reading his, and she suddenly became aware of the tautness of her breasts and the clenching of her abdominal muscles as desire flared through her.

"Ouch! Kitt, you're squeezing me!" Gus's laughing protest broke the spell, and she tore her gaze away from O'Mara's, bending to kiss the boy's cheek and apologize.

"In case you're interested, those doors on the left lead into our bedroom," O'Mara whispered in her ear. "At least, it will be
ours
before too much longer."

"And when do I get a tour of that?" Kitt asked softly.

"How about now? Ready to go in, Gus? Run along and get cleaned up for supper. We'll meet you downstairs in a few minutes."

"Okay. Come on, Hero. You can play with Fifi while I get washed."

"Oh, wait a min—"

"It's all right," O'Mara said, laughing. "She really is harmless and quite tame. She belonged to a stuntman on one of the film sets I worked on. He was having trouble traveling with her, so he gave her to Gus. Hero just likes to watch her. Gus taught him to tap the cage to get her moving around."

He pushed open the sliding door into his bedroom and, with an arm around her shoulders, urged Kitt through ahead of him. It was dim in the room with the fading light, and she took only a couple of hesitant steps forward before turning back to him. He smiled at her encouragingly as he flipped a light switch and filled the room with a soft glow from several floor and table lamps.

Her attention was fixed on that smile, and she felt again the sexual awareness that had been aroused in those brief moments on the deck. Unthinkingly, she leaned into him, bringing her hands up to rest along his hips and lifting her mouth to his. She felt the light stroke of his hands up her back and then his fingers threading into her hair to cup her head and tilt it so her mouth was where he wanted it. Everything else went right out of her mind as he gently teased her lips apart with his tongue and feathered the tip of it around the inside of her mouth until, frustrated, she caught it with her teeth.

"Umm. Witch! Don't bite unless you want more than you're ready to handle." The deep voice was warm and amused, and the large hand that made abrupt contact with her rump was more caressing than chastising. "Control yourself for a minute or two, and tell me what you think of our private quarters. You haven't even looked around yet."

"You distract me," she murmured, still reluctant to move away from him.

Chuckling, he shook his head at her in mock-despair and turned her around to face the big room. Her eyes widened as she assimilated the full impact of a room that might have been designed and decorated just for her. Moving slowly forward and then turning to take it all in, she tried to come to terms with the dawning realization that, unbelievable as it seemed, O'Mara had planned it all with her in mind.

"Do you like it?" The soft question drifted in the waiting stillness.

"How did... how did you know?"

"I've always known what pleases you."

Still soft, their voices were faintly husky with emotion. He watched her intently, seeing the wonder and awareness in her expression and the deepening pleasure in her eyes.

"But you didn't know I'd ever see it. It had been so long, so very long."

"I knew. I looked for you, and I knew that someday I'd find you again. And this would be waiting for you. Our own private place."

"It's beautiful. So beautiful. It's the most beautiful room I've ever seen. Or could ever imagine."

She kept discovering new things, or perhaps it was just that the initial shock was wearing off and she was really
seeing
it all. Hesitantly at first, and then with growing eagerness, she moved about the huge room. Some twenty feet wide and more than twice as long, it was divided into sleeping and lounging areas by a floor-to-ceiling brass screen which extended ten feet into the room from halfway down the long inner wall. The screen had the dulled-gold patina of age, and its primary motif was a magnificent rearing dragon. The room was held together as an entity by the wall-to-wall expanse of deep, plushy, dark blue carpeting and the unbroken stretch of floor-to-ceiling windows along the outside wall. At the same time, the areas of the room were subtly defined by carrying through the Oriental theme with beautiful antique rugs in muted tones of blues, minty green, old gold and soft rose on cream and ivory backgrounds.