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Mickey fumed inwardly. He could have told her that in the first place, but he’d been having too much fun goading her. Though she was ready to spit nails, she found a dignified reply. ‘Very well, Mr Douglas, if you insist.’
‘Oh, I do,’ he returned softly. ‘And I also insist you stop calling me Mr Douglas. My name is Ryan; use it.’
Not a request, but a command. Well, two could play at that game. ‘And my name is Mickey, not Hanlon!’
He had the gall to grin. ‘Hanlon suits you better. Mickey is soft and feminine, while Hanlon is as tough as old boots.’
If she had had an old boot, she would have chucked it right at his grinning face! What had she let herself in for? Even a day in Ryan Douglas’s company would be pure purgatory. But perhaps there was a way she could get a little of her own back. After all, they were on the ground now, but in the air they were in her territory. She’d find out then just what sort of stuff Ryan Douglas was made of!
She looked up to find those intense blue eyes had narrowed. ‘Stop looking like the cat who got the cream, Hanlon. You’re beginning to make me nervous.’
Mickey swallowed back a caustic laugh. The man didn’t have a nerve in the whole of his body! ‘We wouldn’t want that, would we, Mr...Ryan?’ She stressed his name as she caught the lift of his brows. ‘Not when you’re putting your life in my hands.’ She waggled her fingers under his nose, and very nearly yelped when he caught hold of them in his own large, strong hand. She couldn’t have protested even if she’d wanted to, because the jolt of electricity which had shot up her arm at the contact took her breath away. Horrified, she found herself staring at the sight of her own slim hand imprisoned in his, while her heart thudded almost painfully in her chest.
Meanwhile, Ryan was studying his captive. ‘Hmm, long, graceful fingers. Hardly the strong, practical type. Are you sure you’re in the right line of work? Somehow, they just don’t fit the image,’ he mused, and Mickey quickly snatched her hand away, grateful for the excuse.
‘Don’t worry, I haven’t lost a paying passenger...yet,’ she shot back with all the aplomb she could muster, while surreptitiously rubbing her hand down her trousers in an attempt to stop the tingling.
His lips quirked. ‘I don’t like the way you said that. Could you, by any chance, be flirting with me, Hanlon?’
She froze, the animation dying out of her face. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—flirt with him, for to do so would be flirting with danger. Mentally and physically, she backed off. ‘Hardly! Women like me don’t flirt with men like you,’ she enlarged with distaste.
‘You say that as if you’ve met men like me before. Was it one of them who sent you running?’ he queried shrewdly, but only managed to put her on an even keel again.
Secure in the knowledge that men like him and Jean-Luc were too vain to see they might not be the be-all and end-all, Mickey curved her lips with icy amusement. ‘Strange, isn’t it, how men always imagine it must be one of their kind who makes a woman the way she is?’
‘That’s because it usually is,’ Ryan observed watchfully. ‘You’re saying you’re different?’
She laughed, turning to the door once more. ‘I’m not saying anything.’ She refused to be drawn into a personal discussion with him.
Ryan followed her out into the hangar. ‘You don’t need to, Hanlon; your silence speaks for you.’
Unseen by her antagonist, Mickey briefly closed her eyes. ‘Back off, Ryan. You’re my passenger, not my confessor.’
Behind her, he laughed. ‘Do you have anything to confess?’ he challenged, then came to an abrupt halt as she swung to face him.
He had pushed her an inch too far, and her finger stabbed at his chest. ‘If you want a confession, here’s one. I’ve made mistakes in my life, but the biggest one was having anything to do with you!’
Hands hooked into the belt loops of his jeans, he looked down at her mockingly. ‘Why so touchy? Have I hit a nerve or ten?’
Mickey turned away in a movement that was distressingly nearly a flounce. ‘Not even close. I just got out of bed the wrong side this morning,’ she snapped, trying to recover lost ground.
‘If you’d been in it with a man, it wouldn’t matter what side you got out of,’ he sent after her, bringing her round again, cheeks flaming.
Painful memories rose dangerously near the surface, of reckless, selfish taking. But nothing was free. Pleasure had to be paid for. Passion could be a curse, a greedy monster. ‘Sex isn’t the answer to everything!’ she spluttered angrily.
For once Ryan didn’t laugh. ‘If it isn’t the cure, it’s often the cause.’
Mickey was beginning to feel she was being put through an emotional wringer, and every time she tried to free herself she just went round again. ‘Thank you, Dr Freud, and goodnight. For someone who says he won’t work with a woman, you keep harping on the fact that I am one,’ she accused.
‘Just trying to figure out what makes you tick, Hanlon,’ Ryan answered smoothly.
‘Better men than you have tried, and failed in the attempt,’ she shot back, and regretted it immediately when his lips curved drily.
‘Froze them all off, did you? I can’t say that surprises me. So it shouldn’t surprise you to hear you might just have met your match,’ he observed softly, with an undertone which set her heart knocking.
Alarm shot through her system before she could suppress it. ‘You’re forgetting your own rules, Ryan,’ she reminded him, far too breathlessly. She felt vulnerable, and it was a bad feeling, because she knew the enemy was as much within as without.
‘Ah, but then rules are made to be broken. You intrigue me, Hanlon, and that means you might just be worth making an exception of.’
CHAPTER TWO
THE Crest Motor Hotel was a well known landmark in Prince Rupert, sitting on its bluff overlooking the harbour. Mickey had only ever admired it in passing. Entering the lobby, dressed in working clothes as she still was, made her feel that all eyes turned her way. Lord, how she hated that sensation! It plunged her back into another time, when every move she made had drawn avid attention, when she had felt the sting of shame burning her flesh and it had been as if a scarlet ‘A’ had been emblazoned on her forehead.
She had done everything she could to make sure that would never happen to her again, down to wearing non-feminine clothes, and yet, with a feeling of almost hysterical irony, she found herself once again the centre of attention. What was everyone thinking? That she and this handsome, incredibly sexy man were going upstairs to...? She battened down hard on the thought. She was getting paranoid. It was guilt talking. Guilt because she couldn’t ignore the attraction she felt. But only she knew that; everyone else was probably thinking she looked a mess!
Shakily she adjourned the mental court inside her brain which constantly sat in judgement of herself. Yes, it was her appearance which caused comment, and for the first time in years she regretted leaving her designer clothes behind. Tonight she could have done with the boost to her confidence that a fashionable suit would have provided.
As she followed in Ryan’s wake, paradoxically comforted by the thought, she quite missed the fact that the reason people turned to look was because of the natural pride and confidence in her bearing.
Ryan’s suite was on the top floor, above the hustle and bustle of the town, and walking into it was like entering a haven of peace. For all of thirty seconds. It took that long for Mickey to walk inside, take an appreciative look at the comfortable furnishings, and turn round. Whereupon she had the fortune, or misfortune, to be in time to see Ryan Douglas turn the key in the lock, before removing and pocketing it securely. The shock had her eyes swinging to his face to meet an expression so grim that her stomach lurched.
‘What are you doing?’ The question came out in a husky waver, and, dismayed to sound so wishy-washy, she dredged up enough steel to add demandingly, ‘Why have you locked us in?’
He chose not to answer immediately. Removing his hat and coat and tossing them on to a chair, Ryan strode menacingly towards her, halting almost painfully close. ‘Not us, Hanlon, just you. We have some talking to do, and I don’t want you running away.’
The statement was hardly designed to ease the erratic thumping of her heart. She had no idea what was going on, but she didn’t like it anyway. It was hard not to think of all those scary tales of kidnapping, but she told herself this was Ryan Douglas, not some thug. All the same, she was determined to camouflage her growing tension at finding herself in the midst of this new and startling situation.
‘Isn’t this a little extreme for talking over flight plans?’ she attempted to joke, while looking for a means of escape. It didn’t take long to realise they were too high up for there to be any safer exit than the door.
A fact Ryan was fully aware of, and, although he had taken the precaution of locking the door, he still kept himself between her and it. Moreover, he didn’t laugh. ‘Cut out the chit-chat and just tell me where they are,’ he commanded, in a voice which could have shattered rock at twenty paces.
If she’d hoped for instant enlightenment, at his words the darkness only deepened. Completely at a loss, she stared at him, deciding he was utterly mad, and wondering why nobody else had ever noticed it. Hadn’t someone once said the way to handle madmen was to humour them? It seemed to her to be a wise course.
She manufactured a faintly questioning smile. ‘You’ll have to tell me more than that. Where are what? What exactly are you talking about?’ she queried with as much concern as she could muster.
It went down like a ton of bricks. An angry hand slashed through the air, cutting her off so abruptly that she flinched. ‘You know damn well!’
Mickey struggled to make sense of it all. She could feel an incredible anger coming at her in waves. She had never experienced such violent animosity before, not even when the news of her involvement with Jean-Luc had broken, making her the butt of universal condemnation. All at once her knees began to tremble, and her heart to race. This sounded like trouble with a capital ‘T’, and she couldn’t even begin to defend herself until she knew the reason. So she had to continue fighting in the dark.
‘All I know is that you’re crazy! You lure me here under false pretences, lock me in, and then make irrational demands! Whatever you’re looking for, I haven’t got it!’ It was good to feel angry, for it smothered her anxiety.
Ryan moved like lightning to catch her by the shoulders and shake her roughly. ‘God, I should have known you’d be bloody perverse. You’re in it too, aren’t you? Right up to your sweet little neck!’
Though nothing made sense, when danger threatened Mickey acted instinctively. Her foot lashed out, the heavy boot connecting with his shin with a highly satisfactory thunk, and as he yelped and released her she had the presence of mind to quickly put herself out of range beyond the couch. From there she watched him rub his sore leg briefly before straightening to glare at her. She held up a faintly trembling hand to keep him at bay.
‘Stay right where you are, or, so help me, I’ll scream blue murder!’ she threatened, fully prepared to carry it out.
Ryan Douglas’s broad chest rose and fell sharply as he took a breath. He stayed where he was, but not because he was afraid of scandal, simply because it suited him better. Mickey swallowed nervously to moisten a mouth which had taken on the aspect of a particularly arid desert. Clearly he was battling a compulsive urge to throttle her, and it appeared to take a great effort for him to sound reasonable.
‘There’s no need for you to scream. If you don’t want to prolong this unpleasant interview, just tell me where Peter is...where they both are.’
There he went again! Did he think she was crazy too? If she had known she would have told him, just to get out of there. Unfortunately, Mickey was as much in the dark as ever. ‘Who is Peter, and who are “they”?’ she demanded helplessly, with predictable results.
Those incredible blue eyes narrowed. ‘You know, this pretence of ignorance is doing nothing for my patience, Hanlon,’ he said testily, then breathed in deeply. ‘OK, OK, if it will get me some answers I’ll go along with it. But be warned, my patience isn’t endless. Peter is Peter Douglas, my nephew.’
He could have said Rip Van Winkle for all the relevance it had to her. ‘Is that supposed to convey something?’ Edgily, she knew what reaction her response would receive.
His jaw clenched. ‘You’re darn right it should, because Peter is the man your precious sister has got her gold-digging claws into!’
Mickey was stunned. Of all the answers she might have imagined, that had never occurred to her. ‘Leah?’ An awful foreboding clenched her heart as she recalled her own concern over the lack of communication with her sister.
At her mention of the name, a grim smile twisted his lips. ‘So you haven’t forgotten everything,’ he drawled nastily. ‘Yes, Leah. Your scheming sister has got Peter so besotted, he’s run off with her! But let me tell you something: if she thinks she’s got a meal-ticket for life, she’s got another think coming!’
Shock rapidly gave way to anger, which welled up like a volcanic eruption. ‘Hold it! Who do you think you’re calling a gold-digger?’ she challenged violently, seeing in her mind’s eye the sweet face of her young half-sister. Gold-digger? If anything, Leah was quite dismayingly unworldly.
‘What else would you call a woman who convinces a man to run off with her after five minutes’ acquaintance?’
She didn’t fully understand the situation, but she knew Leah was under attack, and that was enough. Like a tigress coming to the defence of her young, Mickey balled her hands into fists. ‘Don’t you dare say another word, Ryan Douglas, because you’ve got hold of the wrong girl. My sister Leah has not run away with anyone. She’s studying for her degree at university.’ True enough, but that niggle of doubt increased. Why hadn’t Leah been in touch?
An eyebrow rose mockingly. ‘Really? Well, believe it or not, she’s found a new career,’ he sneered.
The gibe brought an angry growl to her throat. ‘Well, I don’t believe you! Leah hasn’t mentioned anyone to me. I know my sister, and deceit is beyond her. I don’t know this Peter, but, if he’s anything like you, then it’s my belief that any seducing has been done by your own precious nephew!’ Mickey charged back fiercely, rounding the couch to square up to him.
‘Peter isn’t the one who needs money. He has enough of his own, as if you didn’t know!’ he put in caustically.
Mickey felt ready to explode. ‘I don’t know, and Leah doesn’t need money either!’ She had inherited a considerable sum from both her mother and her father, and could expect vastly more from her grandmother.
Ryan remained distinctly unimpressed by her avowal. ‘That isn’t the impression I got from looking around your business this afternoon. If I’ve ever seen a building in urgent need of repair, then that was it!’ He laughed derisively.
Hot colour washed in and out of her cheeks. ‘Damn you, Leah has nothing to do with my business! Which doesn’t need your money either, just a fresh coat of paint and a nail or two! I’ve been waiting for the time, and the money, to do the repairs,’ she lied bravely, only to see his lip curl.
‘Do you take me for a fool? Do you think I didn’t have your financial status checked out? You’re barely keeping your head above water, Hanlon. If your sister has money, which I doubt, then it isn’t in the quantity you need. Only a large slice of the Douglas fortune is going to bail you out!’
Mickey paled at the knowledge of just how much he knew about her lack of funds, but it didn’t alter one basic fact. ‘If you say I need the money, then why are you calling Leah the gold-digger?’ she demanded hoarsely.
The look in his eyes wasn’t flattering. ‘Who would fall under your spell, Hanlon? You needed Leah to bait the trap, and, once you’d caught Peter, your loving sister would hand over all that lovely money to you!’
Her colour rose with her chin. ‘It sounds very plausible, but you’re wrong on every count! There is no plot—at least, not with my family. I don’t know how you came by your erroneous information, but, whoever your nephew has run off with, it certainly isn’t my sister,’ she protested hardily.
Ryan watched her closely for a moment, as if deciding whether he could get away with what he would really like to do, then swung on his heel and went to pour himself a drink. ‘Tell me, did your father have more than one daughter named Leah?’
Never taking her eyes off him for a moment, Mickey crossed her arms defensively. ‘Of course not! But the name Leah is hardly uncommon. Why pick on us?’
Draining a glass of whisky, he walked back to her. ‘Because that was the name Peter gave in his letter. However, as I don’t expect you to believe me, you can read it for yourself.’ He produced the missive from his shirt pocket, rather like a conjurer.
She accepted the letter, but held it as if it might bite her. However, after reading only the first paragraph, Mickey slowly sank down on to the couch, and started from the top. Whoever Peter was, the girl he described certainly sounded like her sister—A black-haired, dark-eyed angel, who loved him for himself. But he knew his uncle wouldn’t approve, so they were going away together. Nobody was to worry; they would come back when they were ready. There was more in the same vein. When she reached the end, Mickey looked up at the now silent man who stood before her.
The heat of anger had died out of her, leaving her, for the moment, uncertain. She clung to the rug, lest it be pulled completely out from under her feet. ‘There has to be some mistake. Leah would never just run off like that!’ She wouldn’t not get in touch either, but you know she hasn’t, Mickey told herself silently.
‘You know her so well?’
Considering she hadn’t even known of her sibling’s existence until eight years ago, Mickey deemed it wisest not to answer that, even though, in her heart, her answer would have been an emphatic yes. ‘You’re wrong. I know you are. Leah is at the university,’ she declared with all the assurance she could muster. If she could use the phone, she’d prove it.
Ryan dropped another bombshell. ‘No, she isn’t. She hasn’t shown up for classes for the past three weeks.’
The absolute conviction in his voice was enough to startle Mickey. ‘Three weeks!’ she exclaimed in dismay, wishing she could argue, but knowing this, at least, had to be true. Because he could only have found out by checking with the faculty.
Ryan, on the other hand, derived no such certainty from her tone. ‘Do you really expect me to believe you didn’t know?’
She glared at him, having had more than enough of his vile accusations regarding both herself and her sister. ‘If you think I’d calmly sit by while my sister ruined her life, you’re very much mistaken!’ Three weeks! Exactly the length of time since Leah had last called her! Surely her sister couldn’t have done anything so foolish as to run off with a strange man?
Ryan snorted disgustedly. ‘Hardly ruined. Peter must be worth half a million dollars at the last count. Not that he can get his hands on it until he’s twenty-five, which might not amuse your sister at all. I imagine she’s been having a whale of a time deciding just how she’ll spend it.’
At that, Mickey shot to her feet, thrusting the crumpled letter back at him. ‘I refuse to listen to any more of this! If Leah isn’t at the university, then she’s with her grandmother.’ That had to be the explanation. She just knew Leah wouldn’t have done any of what this vile man was suggesting. The trouble was, reference to Grandmother Sophie was hardly likely to instil unqualified confidence. Not that she’d reveal her doubts for the world! No, there was a solid-gold reason for her sister not being at the university, and she was going to find out just what it was!
However, before she could say so, her protagonist was exclaiming, ‘Grandmother?’ in a tone which implied she had caught him off balance for once.
Mickey couldn’t hide her look of triumph. ‘You didn’t know about her, did you? It seems you don’t know everything!’
He sent her a stony look, then marched across to the telephone. Lifting the receiver, he held it out to her. ‘OK, ring her and ask her if Leah’s there.’
She would have loved to—anything to rub his nose in it—but it was impossible. ‘I can’t. Sophie doesn’t have a phone.’ Wouldn’t, was actually a truer word. Her eccentricities were as ever, impractical.
With a muttered oath, Ryan crashed the receiver back into the rest, and gathered up his coat. ‘Then we’ll go and pay her a visit. Where does she live?’
He was already slipping his arms into his jacket as her jaw dropped. ‘You’re crazy. She lives clear over in Kitimat. It will take ages to get there!’
For all the notice he took, she might have been saying Leah’s grandmother lived on the moon. He merely proceeded to unlock the door. ‘I came here with the express purpose of bringing Peter home. I have no intention of leaving without him, nor will I give you the chance to warn anyone by waiting until tomorrow!’
It was like batting her head against a brick wall. And Mickey stamped her foot in exasperation. ‘Don’t you listen to a word I say? I’m not involved in a conspiracy. You’ve been reading too many spy novels.’
Over his shoulder, his look was pitying. ‘Having been found out, you’d hardly be likely to admit to anything. Of course, if what you’re trying to do is keep me from discovering Leah isn’t where you say she is, then I’ll just draw my own conclusions.’
Mickey couldn’t think how she had ever thought this man attractive! He was loathsome. Everything she said was turned around to suit his purpose. Nothing would do but to show him how wrong he was to his face. ‘All right, we’ll go,’ she agreed grudgingly, and joined him at the door.
His smile was sardonic. ‘I’m glad to see you’re an intelligent woman, Hanlon.’
She sent him a daggers look. ‘If I’d had any intelligence, I’d have seen you coming!’
‘You’d have to get up very early in the morning to get the better of me,’ he advised ironically, locking the door after them and ushering her back to the lift.
‘It can’t be that difficult, if your nephew managed to do it,’ Mickey observed pungently.
‘He hasn’t got away with it yet,’ he reminded her, and she pulled a face.
‘How old is he?’
‘Twenty-three.’
