While the Fire Rages (7 page)

Why pain?

Examining the puzzling emotion, Brett absently slipped a twenty-dollar bill into the doorman’s hand before slipping behind the wheel of the Porsche. The key to the puzzle eluded him as he fought his way through the late-afternoon traffic to Wolf’s apartment, which was located in a posh section of the city.

Inside the elegantly decorated duplex, Brett abandoned his case inside the door and drew a straight line to Wolf’s well-stocked bar.

“There should be no pain involved here…except of the physical discomfort type.”

Measuring two fingers of amber liquid into a short, squat glass, Brett wasn’t even aware of speaking the assertion aloud. After swallowing the aged single malt neat, he was fully aware of being vocal.

“Damn,” he muttered as the whisky burned a path to his stomach. “The idea was to quench the desire, Renninger. Not burn a hole in your guts.” He added ice cubes and water to the second drink.

Sipping at the diluted whisky, Brett retrieved his case and climbed the free-standing staircase to the apartment’s second level and the largest of the two guest bedrooms.

Standing dead center in the room decorated in muted tones of blue, Brett relaxed his fingers and let the case drop carelessly to the carpet. He didn’t even hear the muffled thud as the supple leather made contact with the wool fibers. His spine rigid, Brett fought against the urge tugging at him and lost.

Following the emotional dictate, Brett, cursing himself softly, spun around and strode from the room and along the short hallway to the master bedroom. Flinging the door open, he took one step inside then halted, his eyes riveted to the enormous bed—in which, Brett was sure, Wolf was undoubtedly the master.

“Have you had her here, you bastard?”

The sound of his own voice was startling in its harshness. Still it persisted in erupting from his stiff lips.

“While that beautiful creature who bore your children went serenely, trustfully about the business of keeping your home for you in that classy pile of bricks beside the ocean, did you wantonly debase her, and yourself, on that damned island you call a bed, with my woman?”

The echo of his own words slamming back at his mind, Brett remained unmoving for a timeless moment, not seeing, not even breathing. Then, his eyes filling with something akin to horror, he slowly shook his head from side to side.

“No!” Brett’s whispered denial came in cadence with his head motion. “No. I couldn’t, I wouldn’t do something as stupid as fall in love with her!”

Closing his eyes to blot out the offensive sight of Wolf’’s sensual playground, Brett’s lips thinned in endurance of the shudder that rent the fabric of his soul. The body tremor caused a crackle in his breast pocket. In the silence of the room, the crackle had the muted ring of mocking laughter.

Raising his right hand, he slipped the long envelope from his pocket and withdrew the legal document from it. A bitter smile twisting his lips, he opened his eyes and again focused on the huge bed.

“No, brother mine, soiling your own nest would definitely not be your style. You would ensconce her expensively, but apart.”

The document Brett unfolded was the deed to the apartment he had so recently retreated from.

Retreat appeared to be Brett’s order of the day, for now he backed away from his brother’s sleeping quarters, quietly closing the door as he went.

If Brett had found it a struggle coming to grips with his unexpected, unwanted physical need for Wolf’s partner in dalliance, that struggle was as nothing compared to facing the reality of a deeper emotional need.

Never a coward, Brett nevertheless decided that there were times when facing reality was better done with a few stiff belts. Striding out purposely, he went back downstairs to the bar and the comfort of twelve-year-old Scotch.

It was while sipping on his third glass of barely diluted whisky, his elongated frame perched tiredly on a leather-covered, thickly padded bar stool, that Brett finally conceded defeat to the indefinable emotion commonly called love.

God, he hated it.

No doubt about it, chum, he taunted himself wryly. This time your engine has completely jumped its tracks. One might be forgiven for falling hard for the wrong woman once. But twice? Brett shook his head sadly. You, sir, seemed to have developed a penchant for loose-limbed, loose-moraled, shockingly beautiful females. But at least the first one had not been staked out by another man—and that man the silver-eyed Wolf, no less. Brett’s soft, self-mocking laughter skipped the length of the short bar.

If she finds out, she will rip you apart.

So how do you go about keeping the very beautiful, very sexy, Jo Lawrence from finding out?

Propping his elbow on the polished wood bar, Brett held his glass aloft and frowned at the amber contents, a self-derisive smile curving his lips.

You are not going to find an answer at the bottom of a bottle of Scotch, he advised himself judiciously. Finish your drink and go rustle up some food to soak up the booze.

The refrigerator, kept well stocked by Wolf’s part-time housekeeper, yielded the makings of a Reuben sandwich, which Brett prepared with the same ease as he had breakfast earlier that morning.

Deciding coffee would be the prudent drink to have with his meal, Brett brewed a full pot and polished off the sandwich in between deep bracing swallows, all the while resisting the surge of memories of his first disastrous foray into the baffling emotion called love.

As a rule Brett was successful at keeping all recollection of his time with Sondra at bay, but this evening, taut with anger, actually aching with physical frustration, and saturated with whisky, the self-imposed mental barrier refused to stay in place.

Sighing in defeat, his beautiful male lips curling in a sneer of self-mockery, Brett refilled his cup, stretched his long legs out under the table, and let the memories rip.

* * * *

Sondra Malone had taken Brett’s breath away from the first moment he saw her, greeting passengers as they entered the jet bound from Chicago to Atlanta. His first thought had been that she was overall gorgeous. Of average height, Sondra had a neat, trim body with delectable curves, a fantastic mane of fiery red hair, and a face that could, and often did, stop men in their tracks. Of course, there was no outward indication betraying the fact that she also possessed the morals of a back-alley feline. Completely bowled over by her, it was a long time later that Brett learned, the hard way, that Sondra would sleep with anything that wore pants—if the pockets in those pants were heavily lined with gold.

Sipping at the strong black brew, Brett allowed his mind freedom to wander down the pathway to yesterday, allowed his senses to experience the trauma of the time he’d spent with Sondra.

Now, from a five-year distance, Brett realized he’d been a prime target for any Sondra who happened along. He’d been more than tired. After six weeks of flying from Atlanta to Dallas to Honolulu to San Diego to Chicago, on orders from Madam President to “pull the outer reaches of the company together,” he’d been bone weary. As he’d also been without female companionship the entire length of those six weeks, he’d been horny as hell.

Enter the gorgeous redhead!

* * * *

With a snort of disdain, Brett jackknifed to his feet and began clearing the table. When the kitchen was again restored to its usual neatness, he walked slowly to his temporary bedroom, extinguishing lights as he went. After a quick visit to the connecting bathroom for a brief ablution, the plying of a toothbrush, and the natural draining off of some of the liquid he’d consumed, Brett stripped to the buff and crawled between luxurious expensive sheets, only then allowing his memory free run once more. This time, their time together replayed in his mind in detail.

* * * *

Anger tightened his frame, simmered in his eyes as Brett strode along the boarding ramp to the plane.

Damned incompetents! If I performed my duties with the laxity of some of these airline baggage handlers, I’d be tossed out on my ear, Madam President’s son or not.

The recipients of Brett’s ire were the faceless airline employees who had somehow managed to mislay his bags between San Diego and Chicago. The mishandling in itself was bad enough but, on his second day in the windy city, he had been informed  his bags had been sent on to Atlanta and were awaiting him there. Thus Brett had been forced into an unscheduled shopping expedition. Brett detested shopping in general and clothes shopping in particular; he had remained furious over the incident throughout his entire five-day stay in the city. Nothing, not the fact that his exhausting back-to-back twelve-hour-day meetings had gone so smoothly or the congratulatory phone call from his mother, had soothed his abraded temper. That is, not until he’d caught a flash of flaming red hair as he approached the entrance to the plane.

God, she’s fantastic!

Anger forgotten, Brett increased his gait, plunging ahead for a closer inspection of the passenger-greeting flight attendant.

“Good afternoon,” Sondra flashed perfect white teeth. “Your seat is lo—”

“Do you have a layover in Atlanta?” Brett interrupted softly, insinuatingly, his thumb and forefinger dipping into his breast pocket.

“Yes, but...”

“If you feel the need of companionship,” he again cut her off, pressing his embossed business card into her hand, “give me a call.” Giving her no time to respond or attempt to hand his card back, Brett strode into the plane.

Later, while delivering a drink to him, Sondra slid his card into his breast pocket with a whispered, “If you care to wait, I’ll meet you in the departure lounge after we land.”

If he cared to? Brett was grateful for the briefcase resting on his thighs, concealing the evidence of how very much he cared to wait. For the previous two weeks his body had been sending him signals of its need for release of sexual tension. Suddenly his need was centered on the tantalizing redhead.

Upon landing in Atlanta, Brett positioned himself at the long window in the departure lounge, his impatience camouflaged with cool composure, prepared to endure hours of waiting if necessary. The necessity did not arise as within a relatively short amount of time Sondra joined him at his sentry post.

“You’re free to leave already?” Brett made no attempt to hide his pleasure at the sight of her.

“Free for three full days.” Sondra smiled back at him.

‘Three days!” Brett repeated, unabashedly delighted at the prospect. “Is that the norm for a layover?”

“No,” Sondra admitted blithely.

“Then how did you manage it?” Brett grinned in anticipation.

“Wheedling, coaxing, and practically promising my firstborn to the girl who was due this layover.”

Securing her elbow with his long-fingered hand, Brett steered her from the lounge. “Then let’s get out of here before she changes her mind.”

Smiling conspiratorially at each other, they hurried out of the terminal and into a cab.

Before the end of their first twenty-four hours together, Brett was thoroughly besotted with Sondra. She was not only gorgeous; she was bright, vivacious, and witty,

By the end of their second twenty-four hours, Brett decided Sondra was everything he’d ever wanted in a woman. He was so besotted he was beyond realizing that Sondra made a career out of being everything
every  
man ever wanted in a woman.

Sondra’s vacation never did end. The flight from Chicago to Atlanta was her last. After one particularly satisfying bedroom romp during their third twenty-four hours, Brett, positive he’d at last found a soul mate, proposed to her. They were married one week later at his mother’s horse farm in Florida.

Brett, though not a confirmed workaholic, ran a close second in the energy and diligence he afforded the company. Sondra was a lotus eater to the marrow of her bones. The moment his diamond-encrusted wedding ring firmly encircled her finger, she prevailed upon him to come and play with her.

In truth, Brett needed very little coaxing to abandon duty for the intoxicating delights to be explored on the playground of her luscious body. For almost two years he was little more than a figurehead in his Atlanta office. It was only later that Brett would give thanks for whatever guidance had prompted him to hire Richard Colby as his assistant. For Richard not only held down the fort competently, he covered Brett’s tracks completely.

The good life began to pall as their second anniversary crept over the horizon. Unnaturally tired, jaded, bored with it all, Brett announced his intention of going back to work one hungover midmorning.

At first, Sondra pouted prettily and coaxed beguilingly. When those tactics had no effect on Brett’s determination, she turned on the waterworks. It was when the tears failed to dissuade him that she revealed the first glimpse of her true colors.

“God damn you,” Sondra screamed at him. “What the hell do you expect me to do while you play at being the big corporate executive? Join a club of silly damned women who talk of nothing but their brats and redecorating the houses their husbands keep them chained to?”

Startled speechless, Brett had stared at her, unwilling to believe what he was hearing. Shock followed amazement as the tirade Sondra flung at him came straight from the gutter.

Though wealthy from birth, Brett had not led a sheltered existence. He had been all over the world. It would have been polite to say some of the places he’d been in were a mite unsavory. Yet he’d never encountered a female with Sondra’s command of filthy language.

His head pounding from the effects of months of too much Scotch, too many late nights, and total abandonment to the physical senses, Brett, calmly walking away from her in mid-spate, strode from the room.

From that point the marriage that never really was deteriorated rapidly. The twelve months that followed were sheer hell for Brett. Sondra, no longer concerned about his opinion of her, flaunted her true personality. She was just as bright, if bitingly so. She was still vivacious, if frantically so. She was still witty, if sarcastically so. She continually turned Brett’s stomach.