Tough Customer

'For dragging him up here only to get shot! And poor Amanda.'

'He says he called her.'

'He did.'

'She gave him permission to spend the night.'

'It was late.'

'That she knew.' Gauging Berry's reaction, Ski added, 'She didn't know about the cocktail hour and wine.'

Berry raised her hands at her sides. 'Are you going to make something of us having a couple of drinks?'

'No. I was just wondering--'

'What?'

'What kind of red wine goes with work?'

With exaggerated patience, she said, 'The wine didn't come out until dinnertime, and Cabernet goes very well with filets mignons.'

'When did you put the robe on?'

She looked at him for several seconds, then shook her head with puzzlement. 'Excuse me?'

Ski took a step to bring himself nearer to her. 'When I got there, all you had on was a robe.'

A robe made of some soft, filmy stuff that had clung to her damp body, then seemed to dissolve within his grip. The imagery was strong, vivid, and way out of line. As was the irrational anger with which he asked, 'At what point did you put on that robe? When you took off your wet swimsuit? Is that all you were wearing during your dinner hour with Lofland?'

He was leaning in close to her, unnecessarily close. Why? In order to intimidate a truthful answer out of her? Or for a reason totally unrelated to his investigation?

Amanda Lofland chose that moment to come out of her husband's room, and her displeasure upon seeing Berry there was glaringly obvious.

Ski hastily stepped back, placing appropriate space between Berry and himself.

'Hello, Amanda,' Berry said.

Ski thought her apologetic, sympathetic tone sounded heartfelt.

'How is Ben?' she asked.

'Sleeping.'

Amanda Lofland's curtness was in keeping with the anger emanating from her. Ski noticed that her hands were fisted at her sides.

'I can't tell you how sorry I am,' Berry said. 'I would rather Oren have shot me than--'

Amanda's bitter laugh cut her off. 'Oh, I doubt that.'

'It's true.' Berry's voice cracked. 'I would never have thought Oren capable of doing something like this.'

The other woman seemed not to have heard that. Her eyes were narrowed with hatred. 'You had to prove it, didn't you?'

'Prove what?'

'That you could snap your fingers and Ben would come running.'

'What are you talking about?'

'You can't stand the thought that he is happily married to me, so you lured him up here to--'

'Amanda, what--'

'I hated the idea of him spending a day here with you. But I pretended that it didn't bother me. It was for work, after all.'

'It was for work. Our deadline to deliver that campaign is Monday. We are committed to meeting it.'

'Exactly. So what kind of shrew would I have been to say, 'No, you can't go'? What kind of wife would I have been not to trust my husband?'

'You can trust him. Ben adores you. He called you several times throughout the day. I heard him.'

'Oh, yes. He called periodically to assure me how hard the two of you were working.'

'We were.'

'In between dips in the pool and bottles of wine.'

Berry groaned. 'It wasn't like that. Please, Amanda, don't do this.'

She extended her hands toward the other woman, but Amanda Lofland recoiled. 'Do not touch me. And stay away from my husband!'

She sidestepped them and rushed past, blindly colliding with the couple who'd been standing only a few yards away and had overheard everything.

Ski hadn't noticed them until now. Caroline King was staring at her daughter with dismay. It was harder for Ski to define the expression of the tough-looking man with her, but his deeply shadowed eyes were also fixed on Berry.

CHAPTER 6

IT WAS JUST AS WELL THAT DODGE WASN'T IMMEDIATELY REQUIRED to speak, because he couldn't have if his life had depended on it.

He was world-wise and world-weary. Nothing much bothered him. He was hardened to the cruelty one person could inflict on another. Oh, if he saw pictures of starving babies in Africa, or American fighting men torn to bits in the name of some fanatic's god, he was moved, but more toward rage than toward sorrow. Sorrow had little place in the heart of a card-carrying cynic. The same went for all the softer emotions.

He'd thought he had prepared himself to see his daughter. After all, he didn't know her. It wasn't like he'd once had her in his life, had formed a strong attachment, and then had had her wrenched away. He didn't have photographs of the two of them together. He hadn't made memories with her like he'd made with Caroline.

He and his child had no common bond except for a shared bloodline. He figured that when he met her he might experience a few butterflies, maybe a slight dampening of his palms, but those would be the extent of his reactions, and they would be short-lived.

So he was completely unprepared for the profound physical reaction he underwent when he and Caroline rounded the corner at the end of the hospital corridor and Caroline said, 'There she is.'

At first sight of the lanky, auburn-haired young woman, it was as though every cell in his body was slapped with an instinctual recognition factor, as though each stood at attention and declared, 'I know her.'

His heart damn near stopped. He barely controlled the impulse to clutch his chest as he gasped for breath. The sound of rushing air filled his ears. He felt dizzy and uncoordinated to the point that he almost reached out to Caroline for support.

Even more surprising than these physical reactions was the emotional one. A sharp tug deep in his gut, a constriction around his heart, a piercing of his soul, all painful in their intensity.

This beautiful young woman with Caroline's coloring was his flesh and blood, his