Just Another Pretty Face (HT 459) (21 page)

"
Pierce
!"' she screamed. "
Pierce
!"

She launched herself in a flying tackle, knocking his would-be assailant off her feet with a brutal body check, and threw herself at Pierce with enough force to take him down, covering his body with hers as they fell.

One of the undercover operatives grabbed the young woman and hauled her roughly to her feet, yanking her weapon out of her hand. It was a black marking pen, over six inches long but not considered especially lethal.

Nikki struggled to her knees beside Pierce's supine body, unaware, at first, that she had attacked an innocent autograph seeker. All of her attention was focused on the man lying on his back on the length of red carpet that had been stretched over the sidewalk. His face was screwed up in a horrible grimace of pain.

Had he been hit, after all? Was he hurt?

And then, suddenly, he burst out laughing. "Oh, Nikki," he said, between whoops of uncontrollable laughter. "Nikki." He reached up and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her back down on top of him, oblivious to the stares of the fascinated spectators standing all around them. "You're priceless, do you know that? Utterly priceless."

She struggled in his embrace, fear turning to anger and then embarrassment as she realized what must have happened. "Pierce, damn it, let me up, you jackass," she demanded, as flashbulbs began to pop all around them. "The photographers are taking pictures of my underwear."

12

"I'M STILL NOT SURE this is a good idea," Nikki fretted as she pulled the specially built bullet-proof car to a stop in front of Claire's office bungalow. "There seem to be an awful lot of people just wandering around here."

"You can cover me with that cannon under your arm until I'm inside the door," Pierce said, humoring her.

"You're sure it's just Claire and her assistant inside?"

"That's it."

"And no one else is expected?"

"Jeez, Nikki, I don't know who might or might not have business with Claire. She's a very busy woman. But there's a guard at the gate. That man in the little house who made us show him our IDs before he'd let us on the lot? Remember? It's his job to see that no one's allowed access without authorization. But if anyone gets by him and storms Claire's office, I promise to hide in the bathroom, okay?"

Nikki sighed. "I know I sound paranoid. And you probably think it's excessive, especially after the way I overreacted last night, but it's my—"

"Your job," he said dryly. "I know. And you're doing it splendidly."

Nikki eyed him warily, unsure whether to be amused or annoyed by his tone. He was being patronizing, but in a very sweet way. And she owed him some slack after last night; he'd been very sweet about that, too. The hubbub in front of the theater had almost overshadowed what had gone on inside it. As far as the morning's tabloid headlines were concerned, it
had
overshadowed it. "All right. I'll leave you to discuss business with your sister. But you have to promise to call me as soon as you and Claire are finished. Okay?"

"Scout's honor," he said, neglecting to mention that he'd never been a Scout.

She glanced down at Pierce's leg. "Maybe I should just make sure you get up those steps all right," she said, loath to let him out of her sight.

"It's only three steps," he assured her. "And there's a handrail if I begin to feel faint."

"If you feel faint you shouldn't even be—"

He put his hand over her mouth. "That was a joke," he said, his eyes warm with amusement. "My leg is fine.
I'm
fine." He slid his hand around to the back of her neck, threading his fingers through her short, feathery hair. "Kiss me goodbye," he demanded, and pulled her head toward his.

Nikki stiffened her neck muscles against him, just a second too late. And then his lips were on hers, warm and soft and wonderful, and she decided that making an issue out of one little kiss would be silly. Even if it did technically violate their deal.

"Have fun installing your alarms," he murmured against her mouth. And then he slid across the seat and was out of the car. "I'll call you when I'm ready for you to come get me," he said, deliberately rephrasing what she'd said to him. "Now, go."

But Nikki lingered for a few moments longer, watching him as he walked up the steps to his sister's office and disappeared inside, wondering what she was going to do when this job was over and she didn't have his safety as an excuse to spend every waking minute thinking about him anymore.

* * *

CLAIRE LOOKED UP from the papers spread out on her desk, ready to frown at whomever was entering her office unannounced. She smiled instead. "Where's your bodyguard?" she asked, looking beyond Pierce as he sauntered into the room with only the barest suggestion of a limp.

"I sent her home."

She did frown then. "Yeah, right. Nikki wouldn't willingly let you out of her sight for a minute." She fixed him with an expression that reminded him very much of the one his mother used to level at him when she'd caught him doing something he wasn't supposed to. "You snuck out, didn't you?"

"I did not," Pierce said, imbuing his words with a trace of righteous indignation. He dropped onto the gray brocade love seat that was the only piece furniture in his sister's elegant office that allowed of any degree of comfort. "Nikki agreed that I'm as safe here as I would be at home. Safer, really," he added with a grin, "after I pointed out that none of her prime suspects could get to me here."

"Prime suspects?"

"Mrs. Gilmore's niece, Lisbeth. And Kathy. And the gardener." His expression made it clear that he didn't share his bodyguard's suspicions. "I think someone from the pool maintenance company is one, too. Or was it the cleaning service?" He shook his head. "I can't remember." He waved an elegant hand dismissively. "It's not important except that it got me out of the house without her." He lifted his injured leg—a great deal sorer since last night—and placed his heel on the pol- ished marquetry cocktail table in front of him. Elevating it seemed to dull the throbbing a bit. "Nikki dropped me off and went back to see about those damned alarms she's having installed in the house. I'm supposed to call her when I'm finished here."

"But you're not going to," Claire said, correctly reading his expression. She leveled another hard look at him, fully prepared to deliver a lecture on the importance of following the orders that had been issued for his safety. "What are you up to?"

Pierce opened his mouth to tell her and then closed it without speaking.

"Pierce?"

He shrugged and looked away. "Nothing," he mumbled. "Never mind."

"Pierce Barrymore Kingston," Claire said, amazed and delighted, "are you
blushing?"

He looked up at her from under his lashes with a sheepish, uncertain smile, his chiseled cheekbones very definitely pink. "What would you say if I told you I was going over to Buccellati when I leave here?"

"Buccellati, huh?" Claire leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. One perfectly made-up eyebrow arched as she considered him. "Thinking of buying her a little thank-you gift for services above and beyond the call of duty?"

"No," he growled, unamused by her amusement. "I'm thinking of buying her an engagement ring."

Claire's air of cynical amusement vanished instantly. She jumped up from behind her desk and hurried toward him. "Oh, Pierce! I'm so happy for you," she said, dropping down onto the love seat beside him. She leaned over and hugged him. "I was beginning to wonder if you were going to be as pigheaded about falling in love as Gage was." Her blue eyes gleamed with tenderness and amusement. "Do you remember how we had to badger him into admitting his feelings for Tara? Right here in this very office. Remember?"

"I remember."

"God, it was like pulling teeth just to get him to admit he was in love with her. And then he went around, growling at everyone like an injured grizzly before he finally tracked her down and convinced her to marry him." She smiled with wholehearted approval. "I'm so glad you're being more sensible."

"Then you think it's a good idea?"

"I think it's a
wonderful
idea."

"You don't think it's too soon?"

"Too soon?"

"We've only known each other a month," he said, unaware that, unlike all his other relationships, he knew the time frame of this one exactly.

Claire suppressed a smile as she reached out to cup his face in her palms. "All right. Out with it. What's the matter?"

"The truth?"

"Always the best policy."

He hesitated for a moment. "I'm scared," he blurted out gruffly, as uncomfortable as a twelve-year-old boy admitting to still being afraid of the dark.

Claire stared at him for a moment, nonplussed, and then burst out laughing.

Pierce's discomfort edged into indignation. "What's so damned funny?"

"You." She leaned forward to plant a quick kiss on his mouth. "The great love-'em-and-leave-'em Pierce Kingston," she said, shaking her head as if she couldn't quite believe it, "Mr. Macho Movie Star, heartthrob of the Western World, has finally found a woman who has him shaking in his shoes." She laughed again and dropped her hands from his face. "What's the matter? Are you afraid she'll say no?"

He grinned faintly at that. "She might. In fact, she probably will. At first. But I can change her mind," he said confidently, thinking of the way she reacted to his slightest touch. He knew women well enough to know that she was his, if he wanted her. And he wanted her. God, how he wanted her! But... "I don't know if I should." He sighed.

"Why not? Has she got some deep, dark secret in her past that's going to come back to haunt you or something?" Claire asked, only half-teasing.

"No. It really hasn't got anything to do with Nikki at all," he said. "It's..." He shrugged. "I don't know, it's..."

"It's what?" Claire prompted gently, recognizing the very real torment in her brother's voice.

"It's me. It's who I am. Who I've been." He looked into eyes that were the exact shape and color of his. Eyes that had shared his past and his upbringing. "What if what everyone's always said all these years is true, Claire? What if I really am exactly like the old man?"

Claire stared back at him, uncertain what he meant. "Like Dad? Like Dad, how?"

"Oh, come on, Claire. You know what I mean. He's been married what? Six? Seven times? He's had more mistresses and live-in lovers than either of us can count or remember."

"Yes. So?"

"So each and every time he swore he was in love." Pierce lifted his foot down off the cocktail table and got to his feet and began pacing, too agitated to sit still. "That this time—whichever time it was—was it. The real thing. Forever and ever, amen. That's how I feel about Nikki. That she's it for me. The woman I want to spend the rest of my life with." He stopped pacing and looked down at his sister. "But what if I'm wrong, Claire? What if I fall out of love with her tomorrow or next week or next year? I don't want to hurt her. I don't want to hurt myself. But, damn it, I don't want to let her go, either."

Claire shook her head, wondering how anyone could be so blind to his own nature. "How many times have you been in love before now? Not just in lust—I know those are too numerous to count—but truly in love?"

"Well..." Pierce paused consideringly. "When I was fifteen I was in love with..." He shook his head. "No, that wasn't love, because I fell right out of it a year later when, ah—" When the twenty-three-year old actress playing his older sister in a movie had seduced him in her trailer, but he wasn't going to tell his sister about that. "Well, there was Chelsea Payne, the actress I did
Close Contact
with about eight years ago, remember? We were hot and heavy there for over a year." Which was still a record for him.

"And when she married that English playwright because you wouldn't make a commitment, how long did you mourn?"

"I don't know. About, ah..."

"Exactly," Claire said, when Pierce couldn't answer. "You don't remember because you didn't mourn. If you're honest with yourself you'll admit you were relieved to see the last of her. In fact, if I remember rightly—and I always do—you were dating someone else within the week. That doesn't sound like love to me."

"Exactly my point."

Claire sighed. "All right, forget love for a minute and just tell me this..." She fixed her brother with a gimlet stare. "Have you ever felt about any woman the way you feel about Nikki? Have you ever wanted to propose marriage to anyone else?"

"No," he said without hesitation. "Never."

"Well, there you are, then."

"There I am, what?"

Claire threw up her hands. "Nobody's
that
out of touch with their feelings," she said. "I think your problem is the same one Gage had when he fell in love with Tara. Plain, old, instinctive male skittishness. I've heard it's pretty common."

Pierce considered that. "You think?" he asked hopefully.

"Yes." Claire grinned at him. "I think."

"Well, then—" his perfectly chiseled lips curled up in a grin to match hers "—how about letting me borrow your car?"

"Buccellati?"

"Buccellati," he confirmed.

"And if I refuse?"

Pierce grinned. "Then I'll take a taxi and be in even more danger."

Claire sighed and dug her keys out of her purse. "If something happens and you get hurt out here by yourself," she said as she handed them to him, "I expect you to tell Nikki that you overpowered me and took them."

"Thanks, sis," he said, and headed for the door. It opened as he reached for the knob.

"Sorry to interrupt," Robert said, sticking his head inside the office. "But you asked me to let you know when the contracts from Stallone's agent arrived."

Claire stood up and motioned him into the room. "Just put them on my desk. I'll go over them right now."

Robert came into the room. "There's a package here for you, too," he said, holding a small box out to Pierce. "It's marked 'PERSONAL.'"

Pierce took it from his sister's assistant and tucked it under his arm without even glancing at it. "If Nikki calls for me while I'm gone," he said, "tell her I'm in the bathroom. I'll be back soon."