Undercover Mistress

elephants and camels. And once, even in a rickshaw.” She looked away again, across the water. “When they couldn’t take me, they’d bring me back things…marvelous things from faraway places. You saw some of them-in the bookcase in my…in your room.”

“It must have been hard,” he prompted when she didn’t go on. He didn’t know why. Maybe he was thinking about his own daddy again. “To have all that end.”

She flashed him a look. “Oh, it didn’t end. I mean-there was a lot in my life that didn’t change at all when my parents died. I’d always had an army of people looking after me-nannies, housekeepers, maids, cooks, gardeners, lawyers, business managers, music teachers, dance teachers…you name it. That went on the same as before, paid for by the trust my parents had set up for me. I went to the same school-private, but not boarding.” Her smile was wry now. “I was driven to school every day in a limo and picked up afterward the same way. Which wasn’t unusual for the school I went to, actually.”

“So, you mean to tell me everything went on just the same? You didn’t miss your parents at all?”

She flashed him another look, one that stung like a slap. “Of course I miss them. They were the only people in this world who loved me unconditionally. I miss them every day of my life.”

Something tightened inside his chest, and he turned restlessly to face the water. “You don’t have any other family?”

“Nobody.” She shook her head, at the same time lifting her face to the wind and the dying light, as if, he thought, she were shaking off a cloak or a veil. Then she turned toward him and propped one elbow on the railing. “What about you? Are your parents alive?”

Distracted, he shook his head, then amended it with a shrug. “Well-my daddy died when I was just a kid. Momma’s still goin’ strong, though.” He purposely said it in the accents of Oglethorp County, Georgia, where he’d been born and raised, and she smiled in appreciation.

“Any brothers and sisters?”

Grinning, he drawled, “A whole bunch. Three of each.”

She seemed to absorb that for a moment, head canted as if she were listening to voices from far away. She straightened up and pushed away from the railing. “I hope you know how lucky you are,” she said softly.

She left him standing there, alone, listening to the whisper and sigh of surf in the dusk. Muttering swearwords under his breath and wondering why it was he always seemed to feel off balance and uncertain about things after conversations with this woman. Particularly since the words off balance and uncertain weren’t ones he’d ever felt obliged to apply to himself before now.

He didn’t know how he felt about her, for one thing. Though he knew for sure how he didn’t want to feel. Grateful to her, for one thing-although he was; he valued his life a great deal, and was more than glad she’d saved it for him. What he didn’t like was being beholden-feeling as if he owed her something, and her being manipulative enough to hold that over him to get her way. Even if, in a way, he could understand why she wanted it…

Well, he for damned sure didn’t want to feel sympathy for her. He didn’t want to like her, either, not even a little bit, and he didn’t want to fall for the charm and sex appeal she undoubtedly had-in spades. Especially the sex appeal. It was so damned blatant-and still he couldn’t seem to help but respond to it. How stupid was that? Like seeing the damn pit trap right there in front of him and tumbling into it anyway.

The coastal evening chill was beginning to seep into his bones-something that seemed to happen to him a whole lot easier since his brush with near fatal hypothermia. He was about to abandon the uneasy solitude of the deck and head for the warmth of the house and more of Celia’s company, aggravating as it was, when a light came on, illuminating the deck next door. That was followed by the sandy scrape of a sliding glass door.

“Well, I must say, you’re looking a bit more chipper.” The sardonic, English-accented voice drifted across from the neighboring deck as the man Roy had last seen bending over him with a stethoscope moved into the light. He was wearing what appeared to be a purple jogging suit that made him resemble a slightly wrinkled grape, which seemed appropriate, since he had a glass of wine in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

Some advertisement for a doctor, Roy thought.

“Yeah,” he drawled with a half grin as he ambled over to the side of the deck that was closest to its neighbor, “I think maybe I’ll live. I’d like to thank you, by the way.”

Doc waved the cigarette in a dismissive way. “I didn’t do much, I’m afraid. Not much I could do, under the circumstances-I’m sure Celia’s told you. She’s the one you should thank.”

“Yeah,” said Roy morosely, “so I’ve been told.”

Doc chuckled and started to say something, then drank wine instead. Holding up the glass in a “Wait one moment” gesture, he made his way without haste down the wooden stairs to the sand. Roy waited for the other man to join him, then they both sat down in adjoining deck chairs.

“So,” Doc said, leaning closer and lowering his voice, “I take it our Celia has been working her wiles on you.”

“Wiles?” Smiling without humor, Roy shook his head. “I guess that’s a pretty good word for it.”

Doc drank wine, then settled back comfortably in the deck chair, seemingly impervious to the increasing chill. “I had a visitor a short while ago,” he remarked, apparently changing the subject. “Fellow by the name of Max.” He paused to take a puff from the cigarette, then added dryly as he exhaled, “I assured him I have no desire to become involved in anything, which might threaten the peace and solitude to which I’ve grown accustomed. He seemed to take me at my word-although by this time, I suspect he knows more about me than my mum and my ex-wife combined.”

Roy carefully folded his arms across himself and leaned forward, trying to conserve what body heat he could. “Celia said you lost your license to practice medicine. How come?”

“Bad choices, my boy, bad choices.” After looking in vain for an ashtray, Doc flicked the cigarette over the side of the deck onto the sand. “I lost a great deal by them, and have only myself to blame. But I have ‘paid my debt to society,’ as they say, and consider myself fortunate to have such a place in which to spend my exile.” He waved the wineglass, taking in the deck and the dark ocean and sky beyond, then nodded his head toward the lighted square of window behind him. “Not to mention such charming company with which to share it. Although,” he added enigmatically, draining the last of the wine and placing the glass carefully on the floor of the deck beside his chair, “it appears that may be about to come to an end. Ah, well-I always knew that, unlike mine, Celia’s exile was only temporary.”

“Exile? Celia?”

Doc’s eyes widened. “She didn’t tell you?”

“She said she had an accident. Somebody was killed?”

“Killed? Oh, yes.” Doc sat up and shifted around in the chair to face him. “It was a terrible tragedy, really. And Celia very nearly died herself, you know. Broke both her legs…massive internal injuries-to put it in non-medical terms. She’s not been back on her feet more than a few months, actually. But-well, the physical injuries weren’t the worst of it. What really destroyed her was the way the media-and the public, goaded on by the media, no doubt- treated her. Attacked like a pack of wild dogs. There were rumors-and outright accusations, not just in the tabloids, but in the mainstream media-of drug use, alcohol abuse…all sorts of things. Absolutely none of which were true, of course.” He made a disgusted noise. “It was a case of exhaustion, pure and simple. She’d been pushing herself to finish a guest shot on a prime-time show, at the same time her character on the soap opera was involved in a very demanding story line. She fell asleep at the wheel driving home from the set late one night. In itself a tragic mistake, obviously.

“But as for the other…Celia was totally unprepared for it. She’d always had it easy, you know, as things go in this business. She was charming, beautiful, talented and of royal blood-as you Americans consider royalty. Success and adoration came almost as her due. To lose it all, so suddenly…”

“She seems to have recovered pretty well,” Roy said dryly.

Doc grunted as he pushed himself out of the chair. “Don’t let her fool you. The lady is more fragile than she appears. Picture her stamped with the warning-” on his feet, now, and towering above Roy, he waved the wineglass to paint his next words in the air “-Handle With Care.”