Passion and Scandal Page 11

  * * *

  Willow surfaced nearly five hours later, having made half-a-dozen neat stacks of invoices and receipts, placing them according to her best guess as to what they were for. Steve seemed to use a basic, and vastly inadequate, single-entry accounting system. Income in one column, expenses in another, with no provisions at all for dividing anything out into any of the business categories the Internal Revenue Service would find acceptable should they ever decide to audit him.

  Most of the invoices and receipts were fairly easy to categorize once she separated them out—office supplies and equipment, auto expenses, professional fees, taxes and the like. But there were dozens of slips of paper, torn from small lined notepads like the ones he had stacked in his desk drawer, marked with, at best, a name, a date and an amount. She suspected that, like the money he had tried to give Carl Mueller yesterday and the twenty dollars he had given Ethan Roberts' maid this morning, they were bribes for information.

  There was nothing in any of the vast mountain of IRS material she had ever read that covered bribes as a deductible business expense.

  In the end, she gave it up, relegating them to the pile marked Miscellaneous.

  Then, having done all she could until she talked to Steve, she neatly relabeled each section of the cardboard file in accordance with the newly established categories, slipped the invoices and receipts into them, and closed the entire package with two wide blue rubber bands.

  Placing a Post-it note on the top that said Do Not Touch! in case Steve came back to the office while she was gone, she slung the strap of her purse crosswise over her torso, closed up the office, and headed across the street to the Greek deli for a quick sugar fix and a cup of coffee.

  * * *

  By five-thirty, Steve had dug up more than he wanted to know about the life and character of Ethan Roberts. By all accounts from people who were in a position to know, the man was a coldhearted, calculating bastard who wasn't above using anybody he had to in order to get what he wanted, including his own children.

  Steve had no trouble at all believing he could have casually impregnated Willow's mother, then abandoned her and their unborn child to whatever fate had in store for them. It wouldn't have been the last time he'd done it, nor, most likely, the first.

  The only trouble was, there was no way to prove it, short of a blood test, and Steve had no illusions about the possibility of getting Ethan Roberts to voluntarily agree to something like that. Willow could take it to the newspapers, of course, or threaten to—assuming she was willing to take that route to try to force Roberts to admit to his paternity. But Steve doubted it would work.

  Politics, power, and the electorate being what they were, Roberts could probably manage to sidestep any scandal her accusations might bring on his way to the Senate by simply denying them. Hell, Washington was full of men who'd managed to get themselves elected in spite of their unsavory private lives.

  And maybe, if she was lucky, Ethan Roberts wasn't her father.

  In which case, they probably still couldn't get him to take a blood test, because agreeing to do so would be looked at as an admission of the possibility that he might be her father.

  No, any way you looked at it, Ethan Roberts' wisest course was continued denial, no matter what Willow did or said. That way, no one would ever know for sure. They might suspect and whisper, but no one would ever know for sure.

  Including Willow.

  Steve hated to think what that would do to her. After screwing up the courage to start looking after twenty-four years of wondering about it, to hit a dead end now would be a crushing blow. No, not crushing, he decided, instantly changing his mind. Even on the basis of two days' acquaintance, he knew Willow Ryan was too strong and too smart to let a thing like this crush her. But it would be a blow. It would hurt.

  And he hated to think of her hurting.

  He flexed his hands against the steering wheel, thinking with distinct pleasure of beating the truth out of Ethan Roberts. He imagined smashing his fist into that aristocratic nose, landing a couple of solid jabs in that pampered midsection, meting out some tiny measure of punishment for all the pain Roberts had caused to the vulnerable women and children who had been sacrificed to his career.

  Of course, he thought with a grin, Willow probably wouldn't think it was such a good idea. Woman tended to prefer a more nonviolent approach to solving problems.

  But, hell, maybe he was just borrowing trouble, anyway. Maybe they'd find something in Jack Shannon's box of memories that would prove Eric Shannon was her father. Maybe Zeke—Ezekiel, he reminded himself—maybe Ezekiel Blackstone would turn out to be the one. Maybe the operative he'd put on the trail of Donna's old roommate, Christine Loudon, would turn up something. At this point, anything was possible.

  That was the tack he would take with Willow, he decided, as he maneuvered his Mustang into an empty parking space just two doors down from his office. He'd play up the positive aspects of the case and ignore the negatives.

  And hope like hell they found some answers before a very important and cherished part of his anatomy exploded under the force of constant, unrelieved arousal. He'd always thought anticipation was one of the many delicious pleasures of sex but since meeting Willow he was beginning to change his mind.

  The anticipation was killing him.

  Even now, he realized, as he climbed out of the Mustang and pocketed his keys, just the simple anticipation of seeing her again had his lips turning up in an idiot's grin and his heart racing uncomfortably fast. His unprecedented reaction to her was something he was going to have to take some time to think about soon, he promised himself.

  And then he caught sight of her, coming out of the Greek deli across the street from his office, and he experienced that same savage twist in his chest that had taken him by surprise that morning. And he realized he didn't have to think about it, after all.

  It wasn't lust. It was love.

  He, Steve Hart, tough-guy private investigator, a man who'd been making love to women for a lot of years, without ever finding one he could love for a lifetime, had fallen head over heels in love at first sight. With a client. And wasn't that a kick in the pants.

  "Willow," he hollered, raising his arm to get her attention from across the street.

  She looked around at the sound of his voice, her face lighting up with the same happy glow that had caused him to nearly lose his balance that morning in the hotel lobby. She lifted her arm in return, waving back, and started across the street toward him.

  "I can't believe what a mess your books are in," she shouted, beginning to scold him before she was even halfway across the street. "You should be ashamed of yourself."

  Steve just raised his hands, palms up, and smiled.

  She laughed out loud and shook her head, watching him as she moved forward, neglecting to check traffic as she crossed the yellow centerline.

  She was less than halfway across the lane when Steve caught a flash of something out of the corner of his eye; a dark blue car, moving too fast; a driver in a brimmed hat. He rushed forward, squeezing between two parked cars, shouting at Willow to get out of the way.

  She stopped, puzzled by his actions, then turned, seeing the car bearing down on her, and tried desperately to reverse direction and scramble out of the way.

  Steve hit her, waist high, in a bruising tackle, bearing her back over the median line. He felt something graze his calf, nearly jerking him around, and then they hit the ground and rolled. There was a screech of tires. Horns honked. Someone screamed. They came to an abrupt stop, thudding up against the rear wheel of a parked car on the other side of the street, with his body curved over hers and his arms tight around her, desperately trying to shelter her from further harm.

  It took a second for him to realize he wasn't seriously hurt, and then another to realize she might be.

  He loosened his arms a little, very gently, and pulled back so he could see down into her face. "Willow?" he murmured in an agonized whispe
r. "Willow, sweetheart, are you all right?"

  She stirred against him, pushing at his chest to get some air. "Aside from being crushed to death, I think so."

  He was too far-gone to appreciate the attempt at humor. "Do you hurt anywhere?" He lifted himself farther away from her as he spoke, levering himself up onto his knees beside her. "Are you bleeding?"

  "Good God!" someone said before Willow could answer him. "Are you people all right? Do you need an ambulance?"

  "Yes. Call an ambulance," Steve said. "She's hurt."

  "No," Willow said, struggling to sit up under his restraining hands. "I'm all right. Really. I don't need an ambulance."

  Steve helped her to sit up, gently, lifting her so that she sat with her back to the wheel of the car. "Are you sure you're okay?"

  "My elbows sting like the dickens but everything seems to be where it belongs." She lifted her hand and touched the side of his face. "How about you? Are you all right?"

  "I'm fine," he said, brushing away her concern, along with the throbbing in his right calf. "Can you stand up?"

  She nodded gingerly and they helped each other, holding on to each other's arms as they got to their feet.

  "Okay?" Steve asked when they were both upright. He untangled the strap of her purse, gently pulling it down from around her neck. "Everything in working order?"

  "Fine," she said. "How about you?"

  "I'll live." His heart would never be the same, but he'd definitely live. Keeping one hand on her arm to steady her in case she felt faint, he turned toward the small crowd that had gathered around them.

  "Which one of you is the driver of that goddamn car?" he demanded angrily, ready to lay into someone—anyone—for the injuries done to Willow.

  "It didn't stop, man," said a kid dressed in baggy knee-length shorts and an oversize T-shirt. "Just kept right on goin'."

  "Did anyone get the license number?"

  "I didn't get no numbers, man. But it was a dark blue Honda Accord. And it sure was comin' fast, like a bat outta hell. Looked like the driver was tryin' to hit your lady."

  "Are you sure about that?" Steve demanded. His gaze scanned the crowd. "Did anyone else get that impression?"

  "It could have been, I guess," said an older woman who was standing on the sidewalk with a bright green shopping bag dangling from the crook of her arm. "It looked like he might have swerved toward you instead of away like someone would normally do."

  "He?" Steve said. "The driver was a man?"

  The woman hesitated. "Yes," she said. "I think so."

  "Naw, it was a woman," the kid said. "She had blond hair and was wearin' a hat. And she was aimin' the car right at you," he added, warming to the story.

  "What kind of hat?" Steve asked.

  The woman walked away then, along with everyone else except the kid. There was nothing to see. No blood; no guts; nobody maimed or dying.

  "Just a hat. Not cool, like mine." He reached up behind him to touch the bill of the baseball cap he wore. "One of them fancy lady hats that sticks out all around."

  "You mean with a brim?" Steve made a motion with his hand, sketching a hat brim in the air around his head.

  "Yeah," the kid said. "With one of them brims. Pulled kinda low over her face."

  "Did you see what color it was?"

  He shrugged. "Dark," he said. "Maybe black or brown."

  Steve nodded and dug a hand into his pocket. "Thanks." He handed the kid a ten-dollar bill. "You've been a big help."

  "Hey, thanks yourself, man," the kid said, and dragged up the hem of his T-shirt to stuff the bill into the pocket of his baggy shorts.

  Steve turned back to Willow. "Think you can make it across under your own power, sweetheart?" he said, indicating the street with a tilt of his head. "Or would you like me to carry you?"

  Willow smiled and slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow. "I'll walk," she said dryly, and then leaned her head against his shoulder for support. "You lead the way."

  Chapter 9

  Willow had noticed the blood soaking through the lower right leg of Steve's jeans by the time they made it up the narrow staircase and into his office. She tried to insist that he sit on the sofa and wait while she went down the hall to the washroom and brought back a wet cloth but he wouldn't hear of it. They ended up going down to the washroom together. It was one of those old-fashioned ones with a pedestal sink, a dispenser of continuous-loop cloth toweling, and ugly green tile running halfway up the walls. Using one of the clean towels he kept in the lowest drawer of his filing cabinet as a washcloth, they took turns cleaning each other's wounds.

  He dabbed at the shallow abrasions on her elbows first, gently cleaning out the clinging bits of dirt while she gritted her teeth and tried not to whimper.

  "It'll be all right, sweetheart," he crooned, keeping up a steady stream of soothing words while he worked over her, as if she were a child who needed to be reassured. "I'm almost finished. Just a little bit more now," he murmured, stopping every minute or so to make sure it wasn't too much for her to bear.

  And then it was her turn to minister to him.

  "I think you ought to have stitches in this," Willow said, on her knees behind him as she dabbed at the wound on his leg through the jagged tear in his jeans.

  "Is it still bleeding?"

  "No." She dabbed at it again, gently, being careful not to disturb the crust that was already forming. "But it looks awful. It'll heal all jagged if you don't get it stitched up."

  "As long as it's not bleeding, it's fine," he said, twisting around to look down at it. "I wish you'd get the hell up from there." He frowned at her, leaning over to hook a hand under her arm and pull her up. "You'll ruin your dress on that floor. It's probably not as clean as it should be."

  She had to smile at that. "My dress is already ruined," she said wryly. "In a contest between silk and asphalt, silk'll lose every time. Guaranteed."

  He glanced down, noticing for the first time that her pretty print dress was ripped down one side. Without asking permission, he pushed the fabric out of the way to examine her leg for damage. Her panty hose were shredded across her outer thigh, as if they'd been pulled over a grater. The skin beneath looked red and raw. Before she knew what was happening, he had both hands up under her dress.

  "What are you doing?" she squealed in alarm, grabbing at his hands through the slippery silk.

  "Getting rid of these panty hose. I need to see how bad your leg is."

  "All right," she said, knowing she wasn't going to dissuade him once he'd decided on a course of action. "But I'll do it."

  The way he was going about it, she'd end up losing her underpants as well as her panty hose. And if that happened, she suspected their first time would be in a grubby little public washroom up against a tiled wall. While that had a certain rough appeal, she didn't think she was up to it at the moment—and never mind that it wasn't the setting she'd pictured when she thought about making love with Steve for the first time.

  "I have to take my shoes off first," she said, lifting her foot to rest it on the edge of the toilet. She nearly lost her balance when she leaned over to unbuckle the T-strap.

  Steve reached out to steady her, righting her before she had a chance to do more than totter. "What's the matter?" he demanded, fear for her making his voice harsh. "Do you feel faint?"

  "I just got a little dizzy when I bent over like that. I'm all right now."

  "It's not all right, damn it. Here—" he took her hands and put them on the edge of the sink "—hold on to this while I get your shoes off." He sank down on one knee, lifting her left foot, and then her right, up on his other knee to unbuckle her shoes and slip them off. "Okay," he said, looking up at her from his position at her feet. "Let's peel those panty hose down."

  Willow thought fleetingly of her vow to have him on his knees, but this wasn't exactly what she'd had in mind. "Turn around," she ordered.

  "Oh, for cryin out loud," he burst out. "It's not like I haven't seen a w
oman take off her panty hose before."

  "You haven't seen this woman take off her panty hose," she said stubbornly, a touch of asperity in her voice. "And if you don't cooperate now, you may never see me take them off," she threatened, not realizing the promise implicit in her words. She made a little circling motion with her index finger. "Turn around."

  With a reluctant grin, Steve got to his feet and turned around.

  Willow flicked up the sides of her skirt, slipped her fingers under the waistband of her ruined panty hose, and pushed them down to her thighs. Her breath hissed out through her teeth as nylon scrapped over the tender skin of her left thigh. "Not yet," she said when Steve started to turn. "I'll tell you when."

  She eased the shredded nylon down past the scraped area and then leaned against the sink, balancing herself with one hand at a time as she lifted each knee in turn to push the hose off over her feet without bending her head. "Okay," she said, as she dropped them in the trash can.

  There was no way she could stop him from tending to the wound himself, and she didn't even try. Pulling the edge of her ripped skirt up and back with one hand, she held it out of the way while he dabbed at the affected area with the wet towel.

  "It's just a friction burn," he assured her, pressing the cool, damp fabric against her thigh with the flat of his hand to soothe it. "Nowhere near as bad as the scrapes on your elbows. It'll be a little tender for a day or two and you'll probably have a bruise but that's all."

  "Good," she murmured, letting the skirt fall back into place as she moved away from him. "I guess we're finished in here, then, aren't we?" She bent over to pick up her shoes as she spoke, forgetting about the dizziness that seemed to strike whenever she lowered her head.

  The next thing she knew she was lying on the sofa in Steve's office with his hands gently moving through her hair, her eyes and forehead covered by a wet cloth that was dribbling rivulets of cold water into her ears and down her neck. She lifted her hand to push it away.