Sweeter Than Revenge (6 page)

Why?

Because he’d promised Ellis.

And why, when he was young, wealthy and healthy, with a mansion in Seattle and the world by the tail, had he done something that stupid?

To get revenge on Maria.

Still, he loved a challenge and he had a few tricks up his sleeve for the old lady here. He flashed his brightest smile. “Crystal clear.”

“Good.”

Flipping open the file, he took out his notes. “We’ve got ten cities lined up, starting with Louisville, and I thought—”

“What did you think of the book?”

David froze. Luckily his head was down and he had a moment to school his features and lace his voice with syrup before he looked up at her. “The book. Wow. What can I say?”

“Say it.”

“Er…”

She and her stooge seemed to hold their collective breaths, waiting for his opinion. With increasing desperation David tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t give him away. With all the best intentions in the world, he’d read the book. Twice. Apparently that second time had been a mistake, because it made less sense than it did the first time. It was supposed to be about a girl coming of age in Mississippi in the late 1950s, but it was so freakishly weird he couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

He’d had the account managers assigned to Anastasia read it, and they’d all collectively shaken their heads and gone online in a desperate search for a) a translation, even though the ridiculous book was in English; or b) a study aide. Nothing had turned up.

Literary fiction was, he knew, a little different. Not like the linear and therefore logical biographies he liked to read. Anastasia’s book was…well, it was…incomprehensiblewas the only word that came to mind. The pretentious opening lines, which he’d struggled over for what felt like hours, pretty much said it all:

I cry, but the death of crying sends birth to its knees. Who will come? Will the moon hide the intentions, and the lies, and the scorn? The sun cannot. When can the searching begin? Yesterday? Never? The chickens know. Meemaw says you can allus tell if’n you watch the chickens.

He somehow didn’t think Anastasia’s fans, the readers and lovers of Hip-Hop Hottie,were quite ready for Blue Endearment.

“Anastasia,” he said, speaking God’s honest truth, “your book is unbelievable.”

She laughed triumphantly. One of Uri’s hands rested on the armrest of his chair and she covered it with her own, squeezing it. Uri actually cracked a smile, although no teeth showed. Raising her hand to his lips, he kissed it.

Bright-eyed and eager, she turned back to David. “So you liked Sweet Cupcake?”

“Absolutely.” David began to relax a little. “Great heroine.”

“You didn’t think she was too dim-witted?”

“Of course not.”

“And what did you think about the rape scene?”

“Stunning.”

Her smile abruptly faded. Uri gasped and his pasty complexion went, if possible, even paler. The two of them exchanged an uncomprehending look.

Paralyzed, David kept his mouth shut lest he say something even worse than whatever it was he’d just said. He searched his memory banks. There hadbeen a rape scene, hadn’t there? Uri leaned in and whispered something in Anastasia’s ear. David tried to listen—in the utter silence of his office he should have heard everything—but he’d swear no sound escaped Uri’s lips.

Finally, Uri leaned back and Anastasia turned to David. One ringed hand came up to cover her heart. “You…you didn’t read the book, did you?” she asked in a shocked whisper.

“Yes,”David cried, wondering how he’d get himself out of this one. “I read it twice.”

But Anastasia wasn’t listening. Huffing with indignation, she leaned down, grabbed her purse from the floor and lumbered to her feet. Whirling, she stormed to the door with her little shadow hot on her heels.

Cursing under his breath, David jumped up and came around the desk. “Anastasia, wait.”

Anastasia wheeled around, her face twisted with a killing rage. “You’re dismissed!” she roared. “How dare you do this to me? Don’t you know who I am? You’re finished! Do you hear me? Finished!I’m going to call the publisher, and when I’m through with you—”

The door opened behind her, and Maria, carrying a silver tray laden with three tiny cups, appeared. Nicely diverted, Anastasia turned to see who’d come in. For the first time since he’d begun this whole misbegotten public relations job charade, David was actually glad to see Maria.

Maria smiled and, after she laid the tray on the coffee table, clapped her hands like a gleeful child under the tree on Christmas morning. “Anastasia Buckingham?” she cried. “Oh, my God, is it you?”

Chapter 6

Anastasia stood straighter and discreetly adjusted her wig for her adoring fan. An uncertain smile cracked her frigid expression. “Yes,” she said, staring down her nose at Maria. “Do I know you?”

“No.” Maria, breathless with excitement, clasped her hands together in front of her chest and all but danced with happiness. “I’m Maria Johnson, one of the account assistants. I’m one of your biggest fans.” Still grinning, she pressed her hands to her flushed cheeks as if to force some of her overwhelming excitement back into her body. “I’m sorry, I just…I can’t believe it’s you.”

The last of the ice encasing Anastasia’s rigid body cracked and fell away. Like the pope receiving a kiss on his ring, she held her hand out to Maria. David half expected Maria to fall to her knees in gratitude, but she just shook it, still smiling. Darting a glance over Anastasia’s shoulder, she caught his eye and, deep in the laughing depths of her brown eyes, David recognized mischief.

That was when he felt the next stirrings of suspicion.

He took a closer look at Maria and didn’t like what he saw. The sexy red suit she’d worn earlier was gone. Maybe that was where she’d been—home to change her clothes. Now that wet dream of a body was wrapped in a fluttery, ruffled purple-flowered dress that would scream innocence on any other woman. The same Barney purple that looked so god-awful on Anastasia made Maria look like the fairy princess of all his X-rated fantasies. A pearl necklace—when had Maria ever worn pearls?—dangled from the long column of her throat, knotted, and disappeared into the deep V of her cleavage.

“And you must be Uri,” Maria said, whirling to take the flunky’s hand.

David stifled a smirk. The pretty princess wouldn’t be quite so happy when Uri snubbed her, would she? David couldn’t wait to see the look on Maria’s face—

Uri’s broad grin stretched back to his ears, displaying shocking white teeth that marched around his mouth like the planks of a picket fence. Taking Maria’s hand, he pressed it between his own.

“Hullo,” he said in a British-accented voice that was startlingly deep and resonant.

David gaped at him, trying to reconcile the little man’s voice—he had a voice, after all!—and his body, but it was impossible. It was as if Pee-wee Herman had opened his mouth to speak and James Earl Jones’s voice had come out.

Worry lines crinkled Maria’s smooth forehead. “I’m a little anxious about Mercury going retrograde, aren’t you, Uri? My cell phone died this morning.”

Anastasia and Uri emitted identical shocked gasps that David would have found funny under other circumstances. Uri stared at Maria for several long, worshipful seconds and then made a choked, joyous sobbing sound. “Darling!” Pulling Maria closer, he kissed her on both cheeks and threw his arms around her as if she were his long lost sister.

Seeing all this syrupy affection directed toward Maria by the duo that would have happily drawn and quartered him a minute ago, David’s blood surged to a full rolling boil. He cursed under his breath, but Anastasia and Uri were too enraptured with Maria to notice. Maria, however, shot him a knowing sidelong glance from under her eyelashes, and her smile widened.

With difficulty Maria pulled free of Uri. “Well,” she said, fishing around in some deep pocket in her skirt and pulling out a tattered paperback with wrinkled yellow pages. “I’m so sorry to interrupt. I’ll let you get back to your meeting. But, Anastasia, would you please inscribe Harlem Hoochiefor me? Just put ‘For Maria.’”

Anastasia looked dubious as she took the book. Sure enough, when she tried to open it to the title page, the cover fell off. Several inside pages slid out and fluttered to the floor. Anastasia’s shocked gaze locked with Maria’s, and Maria cringed.

“What on earth have you done to my book, love?” Anastasia cried.

Maria scurried to pick up the fallen pages. “It’s my favorite book,” she said. “I reread it and I’ve taken it to the beach with me, so it’s a little—”

Anastasia turned to Uri. “Make a note,” she barked. “When we leave here you call the office and get my secret’ry to send this poor child my whole backlist. No fan of mine should have to read a battered book like this.” For dramatic effect she tossed the book in the trash can with a resounding thunk.

Maria pressed her hands to her heart. “Thank you,” she said in a choked voice. Tears shimmered in her eyes. “And I…well, I hope you don’t mind, but I couldn’t wait till Blue Endearmenthit the shelves, so I bought an advance reading copy on eBay a few weeks ago. It’s astonishing.I cried when Sweet Cupcake lost the baby. If this book doesn’t win the National Book Award, I’ll—”

Enraptured, Anastasia stared at Maria. David snorted.

“Well, I’m rambling,” Maria said apologetically as she turned to the door. “I’ll let you get back to your meet—”

“Wait, love!” Anastasia commanded. She pinned David with a fierce gaze and his heart sank. “I want this precious girl to work on my campaign.”

Acid roiled in his stomach, threatening to burn through his gut and incinerate his shirt. Work directly with Maria? On a huge campaign? Late nights with Maria? Travel with Maria? Maria?The sexiest woman in the universe? The woman who only had to walk in a room to turn his body inside out and upside down? The woman who’d ripped his heart out of his chest, stomped on it, then spat on it for good measure?

Hell no.

It was one thing to supervise her from a distance and jerk her chain from afar. David had some self-control, after all. But how long could it last if he had to work closely with her? Not long. He already lived in the same house with her and had to sleep with the knowledge that her bed—with her scantily clad body in it—was only a few feet down the hall. Working closely with her was too much. Out of the question. He wouldn’t do it.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Anastasia,” he said smoothly. “But Maria just started here, and she hasn’t got the experience you’ll need. Don’t worry, though. We’ll take good care—”

Like a grizzly bear rising on her hind legs to scratch her back against a tree, Anastasia drew herself up to her full height. “I want Maria,” she said in a chilling, otherworldly voice that sounded like that of the possessed girl in The Exorcist.

Out of Anastasia’s line of sight, Maria flashed him a smug, triumphant smile before she schooled her features and tried to look worried. “I couldn’t,” she said to Anastasia. “I’m just an account assistant, and I do the filing and stuff envelopes—”

“I won’t hear of it,” Anastasia roared, rounding on David. “You put Maria on my campaign—right now!—or I’ll ring Essex House so fast your head’ll spin.”

An ominous silence fell.

David stretched his lips across his teeth in a faux smile for Anastasia’s benefit, and forced himself to speak in a pleasant voice. “If you’ll just give us a moment,” he said to Anastasia, his back teeth clenched so tightly he felt like a ventriloquist, “I need to speak with Maria.”

Anastasia crossed her arms over her chest like a sulky child and watched while David and Maria left his office. Once in the hall, he grabbed Maria’s upper arm and marched her through the secretaries’ cubicles and down the hall to the nearest empty office. Pushing her inside, he shut the door behind them.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he snarled. Maria’s wide-eyed, Who, me?expression, as authentic as a Rolex purchased from the trunk of someone’s car, only pissed him off more. “Don’t think this little charade is going to work.”

Blinking at him, she crinkled her brow as if she couldn’t possibly begin to understand what in the world he was talking about. “Charade? What do you mean?”

“This.”Waving a hand at her dress, he jerked the filmy material at her shoulder. “This.”He grabbed the pearl necklace and let it drop. “Your whole ‘Anastasia, I love you, you’re soooo wonderful. Oh, Uri, when will Jupiter be in Neptune’ routine,” he said, fluttering his eyelids and speaking in a high-pitched voice. “It’s not going to work.”

She laughed triumphantly. “It didwork, David—in case you didn’t notice. Anastasia wants me to work on her campaign.”

“Yeah, well, shedoesn’t get the final word.”

“Oh, I think she does.”

Toe to toe, he glared and she grinned, but then something shifted between them and the air became hot and charged. Dangerous. Her smile slipped away, leaving behind a bright, intent light in her eyes.

Lust suddenly made him crazy, heating his blood and his skin, and making him want to slip his hands underneath her fluttery dress and caress her bare thighs. He shuddered and choked back the groan, but not the serrated exhalation. Thinking always became impossible when she was this close, but right now he couldn’t see why that mattered. Smelling her faint, delicious scent of lemon and flowers seemed far more important. Still, if he had half the sense God gave a squirrel, he’d move away—far away—from Maria.

He didn’t move a muscle.

She did things to him, this woman. Always had, damn her. Her simplest looks and touches, the merest whiff of her fragrant skin, did something to him, and he didn’t like it one little bit. Maria—only Maria—regressed him and turned him into a fumbling fool with no more control over his body than an eleven-year-old with his first erection.

Touch her, touch her,his body chanted. He shifted closer.

“Surely you remember she was about to fire you before I came in,” Maria said.

“No, she wasn’t.”

Her cheeks flushed with hot, pretty color. Worse, her gaze flickered down to his mouth as he spoke, lingering.

Kiss her, kiss her,became the chant, and he wondered what those dewy, pouty lips would taste like, and if they’d be as sweet as he remembered.

Enough was enough. He’d wanted to stand where he was and fight, but the flight response won out. Better to retreat while he could and live to fight another day. What sane man could withstand this kind of attraction for more than ten seconds? Shrugging, he slid his hands into his pants’ pockets and sauntered over to look out the window.

“Maria, Maria,” he said over his shoulder, trying to sound as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “Devious, aren’t you?”

She stared, not answering.

“Well, it’s not going to work.”

Angry suddenly, she threw her arms wide. “Don’t let your stupid pride—”

“I’m not stupid or proud.”

“—stop you from doing what’s right, David. I can help you.”

“I don’t want or need anything you have to offer, Maria.”

Her startled, hurt expression told him she knew—as well as he did—that they weren’t talking about work. Swallowing hard, she seemed to regroup.

“She’ll tattle on us to the publisher if you make her mad,” she said, looking uncertain. “And then Essex House will fire us, and we’ll lose a huge client.”

Unwilling to call her bluff and needing a graceful way off the battlefield, he decided to act like he’d won the point. Like he’d been in charge the whole time—as if he’d ever been in charge where Maria was concerned.

“Yeah, why not? I’ll give you a shot, Maria—”

Her sweet, delighted grin signified his defeat and was more than he could take right now. Hurting her would make him feel better, so he lashed out.

“—and I’ll watch while you blow it, just like you blow everything.”

Ignoring the flash of pain in her eyes, he snatched the door open and waved her through it. And as he followed her back down the hall to his office, he cursed himself for his weakness where this one woman was concerned, and for his stupidity. The protective wall he’d built, brick by brick, around his heart, would notcrumble. No way. Soft feelings toward Maria were not allowed, and he would notgo easy on her. He wouldn’t admire her, either. So what if she was gutsy? So what if she’d cleverly outmaneuvered him? So what if she seemed vulnerable?

It didn’t matter. None of it mattered—except his revenge.

He’d be strong. He’d make her pay. Only then could he be whole again.

As soon as they’d finished the meeting with Anastasia and Uri, David turned to Maria and stared at her with glittering, stony eyes. “Why don’t I show you your office?”

No,she wanted to say. Judging by his expression, going anywhere with him would be about as safe as accepting a ride in Ted Bundy’s Volkswagen Beetle. She’d one-upped him this morning, and obviously he had no intention of letting her get away with it. Even so, she was no coward.

“Okay,” she said, and he steered her down the hall. “Is it the big empty one next to yours?”

“Uh-uh. You can’t leapfrog over all the other people who’ve been here longer, Maria,” he told her. “As I believe I mentioned, the boss’s daughter gets no preferential treatment here.” His sharp, smug gaze swung back around to her, obviously hoping she’d pitch another fit for his amusement. “That won’t be a problem, will it?”

Even though she had a sudden and fierce urge to punch him right in his smug grin, she managed a carefree laugh. “Of course not. I’m a team player.”

“Good.”

He stopped. They’d gone through a heavy door and reached a gloomy, remote corner of the office so far away from his it probably had a different zip code. Overhead, a fluorescent light hummed and blinked ominously, threatening to die at any second. David opened a door, turned into a dark office, and flipped a switch, illuminating a space that looked much better unlit. She couldn’t bring herself to go inside, so she just stood in the doorway and peered in, aghast.