Sweet Liar (3 page)

A suitcase in each hand, Samantha had gone down the stairs and was three houses down the block by the time he got the door unlocked.

Bounding down the stairs two at a time, Mike came to a stop in front of her and reached out to take her bags, but she jerked them away from him, trying to walk around him, but he wouldn't let her pass.

“You're not mad because I was late, are you?”

Giving him a quick, hard glare, Samantha again tried to move around him. After three pivots and his blocking of every one of them, she turned and started walking in the other direction, but he blocked her that way too. Finally, she stopped and glared at him. “Would you please let me pass?”

“I don't understand,” he said. “Where are you going?”

Intelligent stupid people, she thought. Was this city full of them? Still glaring at him, she said, “Mr. Taggert, I am going to find a hotel.”

“A hotel? But I have your apartment ready for you. You haven't even seen it yet, so you can't dislike it. It's not me, is it? I told you I was sorry I was late. I'm not usually late, but my watch got wet last week and it's in the shop and I couldn't tell what time it was. And those bozos I was with probably couldn't tell time if they had a watch and could figure out how to buckle it on.”

Giving him a look that was meant to wither him on the spot, Samantha moved around him.

He wasn't to be put off so easily as he stepped back in front of her and started walking backward. “It's the guys, isn't it? Pretty crude, aren't they? I apologize for them. I only see them when I want to toss a ball around with someone and at the gym. I mean, I don't see them socially, if that's what's worrying you. You won't have to see them in our house. I promise.”

Halting for a moment, Samantha had to marvel at the man. How could he be so very beautiful and understand so very little? She forced herself to look away from him. It was his beauty that had gotten her into trouble in the first place.

When she started walking again, he was beside her. “If it's not that I was late and it's not the guys, then what's the problem?” he asked.

At the corner of the block, she stopped. Now what was she to do? she wondered. She had no idea where she was or where she was going, but she saw lots of yellow taxis driving by. In the movies people hailed taxis by standing on the curb and lifting their arms, so she hoisted her tote bag onto her shoulder and raised her arm. Within seconds a taxi came to a halt in front of her. Acting as though this was something she'd done a thousand times, she put her hand on the car door.

“Wait a minute!” Mike said as she started to open the door to the cab. “You can't leave. You've never been in the city before, and you don't know where you're going.”

“I am going as far away from you as I can get,” she answered, not looking at him.

Mike's face was the embodiment of surprise. “But I thought you liked me.”

With a gasp of exasperation, Samantha started to get into the cab.

But Mike stopped her by taking her suitcase, then her arm, both of which he held firmly. “You're not leaving,” he said; then, glancing into the cab at the driver, he said, “Beat it.”

The driver took one look at Mike, at the muscles bulging on his body, most of them exposed by the skimpy clothing he was wearing, and asked no questions, not even waiting for Mike to slam the door before he sped away.

“All right,” Mike said quietly, as though talking to a skittish horse. “I don't know what's going on, but we're going to talk about it.”

“Where? In your house? The house where I'm supposed to live with you?” Samantha asked angrily.

“Is that what this is all about? You're mad at me because I kissed you?” Giving her a slow, soft smile, his voice lowered significantly. “I rather thought you liked my kissing you,” he said, stepping closer to her.

“Get away from me.” She took a step backward. “I know this is a city that's not supposed to care, but I imagine someone will pay attention if I start screaming.”

At that Mike stepped back and looked at her. She was dressed in a prim little “outfit”—that's the only word he could think of to describe what she had on—of navy blue. It was a very plain dress with a skirt that reached below her knees and a jacket with a white collar and cuffs. Somehow, that boring little dress managed to completely hide every curve of her body. If Mike hadn't just had his hands all over her and hadn't felt for himself what an incredible body she had, he would have thought she was as straight as a stick. When he'd kissed her, he'd found his hand at the small of her back, atop what seemed to be a rather deliciously curved fanny, and he'd run his hand down the length of her, over the lovely curve of her bottom, down firm, perfect thighs, down to her ankle and her slim little foot. He would have taken odds on it being impossible to hide a body like hers under any amount of clothing, but somehow she had done it.

Looking at her face, he saw that she was a cross between pretty and cute, but she wore very little makeup, as though she meant to detract from her prettiness rather than enhance it, and her hair was pulled tightly back from her face. He could tell her hair was long, and the way she wore it made it look absolutely straight, but a wisp had escaped from the band at the back and the stray strand curled along her cheek. Remembering his thumb pulling that strand loose, Mike now wished he could touch it again.

Looking at her now, it was difficult to believe that this was the woman he'd kissed, for there was no sexiness in her face or her body. Actually, in her prim little dress, her blonde hair pulled back in a neat and utterly tidy bun, he would have thought she was the mother of a couple of children and taught Sunday school. If he had passed her on the street, he wouldn't have looked twice at her. But he remembered vividly that he'd seen her looking very different a few minutes ago. The lusty, desirable, hungry beauty who had kissed him was in there somewhere.

When he had leaped around the stairs to catch the football, he had nearly trampled her, and out of instinct, he had caught her before she fell against the spikes of the railing. He had opened his mouth to ask if she was all right, but when he had looked into her eyes, he'd not been able to say a word, for she was looking at him as though she thought he was the best-looking, sexiest, most desirable man in the world. Mike had known since he was a kid that he was attractive to girls and he'd used his looks whenever possible, but no woman had looked at him as this one had.

Of course he had to concede that maybe he had been looking at her in much the same way. Her big, soft blue eyes had been filled with surprise and desire, looking at him from over a small, pert nose that was set atop a mouth so full and lush that he thought he might die from wanting it so much.

He'd kissed her, at first not sure if he should, because he didn't want to do anything to scare her away, but the moment his lips touched hers, he knew he couldn't stop himself, knew he couldn't hold back. No woman had ever kissed him as this one did. It wasn't just desire he felt coming from her, but hunger. She kissed him as though she'd been locked in a prison for the last ten years and now that she'd been released, he was the man she wanted most in the world.

Right now Mike didn't understand what was going on with her. How could she kiss him like that and ten minutes later look at him as though she detested him? For that matter how could this proper little lady be the same enchantress who'd wrapped her leg around his waist?

Mike didn't have answers, nor did he understand anything that was going on, but he knew one thing for certain: He couldn't let her get away from him. He
had
to find out what was making her want to get away from him. For his part he'd like to pick her up and carry her back to his house and keep her there, maybe forever. But if she wanted something from him first, like maybe for him to climb to the heavens, pick up a dozen or so stars, string them together, and hang them in her bedroom, he thought he would like to know so he could start tying ladders together.

“I apologize for whatever I did to offend you,” he said, although he didn't mean a word of it. All he could remember was her ankle on his waist.

Samantha narrowed her eyes at him. “Is that supposed to make me believe you?” Taking a deep breath, she tried to calm down, for she was aware that they were beginning to draw the attention of the people on the street.

“Couldn't we go somewhere and talk about this?” he asked.

“Your house maybe?”

Missing the sarcasm in her voice, Mike thought that was a fine idea but didn't say so.

“There's nothing to talk about.”

This time there was no missing her insinuation that she believed his house to be a den of sin. Mike took a deep breath. “We'll go back to the house, sit on the stoop—in plain sight of all of New York—and talk about whatever the problem is. Later, if you still want to leave, I'll help you find a hotel.”

Samantha knew she shouldn't listen to him; she should hail another cab and find somewhere to spend the night.

“Look, you don't even know where you're going, do you? You can't get into a cab and say, ‘Take me to a hotel.' Not any more. You don't know where you'll end up, so at least let me call and make a reservation for you.”

Seeing her hesitation, Mike took the opportunity to start walking toward his house, hoping she'd follow her suitcase and tote bag. Not wanting to press his luck with the headway he'd made with her, he didn't say any more as he walked, moving slowly, but stopping now and then to make sure she was following him.

When he reached the town house, he carried her bags to the top of the stairs, set them down, and turned to her. “Now, you want to tell me what's wrong?”

Looking down at her hands, Samantha knew that she was very tired from the long, exhausting day. For that matter, it had been a long, exhausting year. “I think the problem is obvious,” she said, trying not to look at him because he had on so very little clothing. While he stood there leaning against the rail, he reached inside the old sideless sweat shirt he wore to scratch his chest, and Samantha saw a stomach covered with washboard muscle. When he said nothing, she spoke again, this time intending to make herself very clear. “I do not plan to live in the same house with a man who will spend his time chasing me all over the place. I am in mourning for my father, I have just ended my marriage, and I do not want more complications.”

Perhaps Mike shouldn't have taken offense at her words, but she made him sound like a dirty old man who couldn't keep his hands off the luscious young girl. Resisting the temptation to point out that he had by no means forced himself on her, he was also tempted to tell her that all they had shared was a kiss, nothing more, and that there was no reason to act as though he were a convicted rapist who'd just tried to molest her.

“All right,” he said in a cold tone. “What are the rules?”

“I have no idea what you're talking about.”

“Oh yes you do. Anybody who dresses as you do must live by rules, lots of them. Now tell me what your rules are.”

At that Samantha picked up her tote bag and reached for her suitcase, but putting his hand on it, he wouldn't let her have it.

“All right,” he said again, this time with a sigh of defeat. “I apologize again. Couldn't we start over?”

“No,” she said. “It's not possible. Would you please release my bag so I can leave?”

Mike wasn't going to let her leave. Besides the fact that he wanted her so badly there was sweat running down his chest even though it was a cool day, there was his promise to her father. He was aware that she knew nothing about how close he had been with her father, didn't know that Dave and Mike had spent quite a bit of time together until Dave had told him Samantha was coming home. After that announcement Dave had confined their friendship to letters, which had been sent to the attorney, because for some reason, Dave hadn't wanted Mike and Samantha to meet, at least not while Dave was alive. Then, two days before Dave died, he had called Mike, although by then Dave had been too weak for Mike to hear all of what he had to say, but Mike had understood the essence of it. Dave had said he was sending Samantha to him in New York and he had asked Mike to take care of her. At the time Mike hadn't felt he'd had any other choice, so he'd given his word that he'd protect her and watch out for her. But so far, Mike didn't think these last few minutes were what Dave had in mind.

Mike looked down at Samantha's two bags. “Which one has your overnight things in it?”

Samantha thought that was a very odd question, but then the last few minutes had been the oddest of her life.

Not waiting for her answer, he picked up her tote bag and opened the door to the house. “Five minutes, that's all I ask. Give me five minutes, then ring the bell.”

“Would you please give me back my bag?”

“What time is it now?”

“Quarter after four,” she answered automatically after a glance at her watch.

“Okay, at twenty after ring the bell.”

Shutting the door behind him, he left Samantha standing alone on the stoop, half of her luggage missing. When she pressed the doorbell, there was no answer. She was tempted to take her large case and leave, but the fact that her remaining money was hidden in her tote bag made her sit down on her suitcase and wait.