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She swallowed. “I see your point.” She was trying very hard to act cool and professional, but deep inside, oh, how she wanted him to get to know her better. “I live alone just like you.”
“Ah-ha,” he mused aloud. “A single woman interviewing the sex life of a single man. Could hold a lot of intriguing possibilities. Like, what if—”
“The tour?” she reminded him, to get his mind off that train of thought fast.
“Of course, the tour, Professor,” he said, very mannerly but obviously getting a kick out of all this.
But no matter how much she tried, Rachel could barely concentrate on his house. In his spacious hi-tech kitchen, sunlit breakfast area, elegant dining room, floor-to-ceiling library of books, and movie screening room, she saw only Zane.
Because Zane Farrell didn’t seem like a man she’d just met. She felt as if she’d known him for aeons.
“What do you think of the gym?” Zane asked, breaking into her reverie.
The shiny hardwood-floor gym had blue floor mats, weight machines, treadmills, StairMasters, rowing machines, barbells, and stationary bicycles. Small red dumbbells were carelessly strewn on the floor, and she had to sidestep a couple to avoid tripping.
“This place is bigger than my local health club,” she commented.
“It’s unreal, isn’t it?” he agreed.
“You sound like an amazed visitor rather than the owner of this place,” she noted.
“Can’t I appreciate the exquisite sight in front of me?” He was gazing straight at her, as if she was the only sight he was aware of.
She nervously clutched her briefcase and stared down at the gym equipment. For a second, she fantasized Zane, halfnaked, working up a heated sweat with his muscles bulging as he lifted the heavy weights.
“Professor, I suppose you’re viewing this gym in a sexual way,” he said.
“N-not exactly.” Her cheeks flamed, thinking he had lasered into her fantasies.
“Really?” he went on. “I thought you experts say exercise increases sexual endurance.” The roguish glint in his eye made her realize that he was still having fun with her interview. He wasn’t treating it seriously at all.
“Is the need for sexual endurance the reason you pump iron?” she asked, her chin up for battle.
For a split second, she thought she saw him wince at her insinuation. She wished the words hadn’t come out of her mouth so fast.
He tilted his head to one side. “Professor, my pumping is not restricted to bars of metal.” He kiddingly winked at her for emphasis.
Suddenly furious that he was ridiculing her sex research, she quickly stepped back to exit the gym when her foot stumbled over a dumbbell.
“Ohhhhh!” she screamed as she felt herself go flying.
“Rachel!” Zane called out.
Just then, his powerful hands circled her waist and lifted her. With her feet off the ground, she clutched his strapping upper arms to steady herself, feeling the forceful, protective strength of him.
Zane’s firm broad fingers were gripping her body just below her breasts. His large thumbs were pressed up againsteach swell. Suddenly her nipples ached to be squeezed and fondled by him.
Zane’s face was so near she could smell his warm minty breath. His marine eyes focused on her lips.
Her heart jolted, and her pulse pounded. More than anything, she wanted him to kiss her.
She could feel his breath quickening. The muscles of his arms tensed under her palms as he pulled her closer to his hard body. His mouth edged toward hers, and her lips impulsively moved to his.
But as his lips grazed hers, she abruptly became conscious of her unethical behavior. What was she doing? She was a representative of the university, but she was acting like a foolish woman mesmerized by a very sexy man.
Rachel immediately freed herself from Zane’s sturdy grasp and set both feet back on the floor. Maybe she shouldn’t have allowed two years to go by without being with a man. Maybe all her pent-up sexual energy was suddenly letting loose on the very masculine Zane Farrell.
She avoided his confused eyes, feeling embarrassed and ashamed. She grabbed her fallen briefcase and smoothed down her dress, which had risen to her bare thighs.
“This entire interview has been a big joke to you, hasn’t it, Mr. Farrell?” she blurted.
His jaw muscles tensed, momentarily stung by her words. “Is that what you think?”
“Darn right!”
“Am I supposed to act like Joe Serious while you’re questioning my virility?” he shot back. “You’ve been peering at me like I’m some guinea pig for sexual dissection.”
Her eyes widened in red fury. “Then why did you volunteer for the study?”
“I obviously made a tremendous mistake, didn’t I?”
“Are you saying you’re withdrawing your name from this research project?” Her voice was so high-pitched she could barely recognize it. “Because if you are, go right ahead!”
“Fine, Professor Lady!” He abruptly turned to lead her downstairs straight to the double copper doors.
Her hands were sweating against her leather briefcase handle as she hurried after him. What was she saying? She couldn’t afford to lose her first case study. The university’s administration would surely contact him to ask why he’d dropped out of their research project. He’d inevitably tell them that she’d completely ravaged the interview. She couldn’t let him ruin her very first research project!
She bit back her pride for one torturous moment.
“Can’t we discuss this matter more calmly, Mr. Farrell?” she asked, searching for the right words to get him back on track with the study.
“Zane,” he corrected as he stopped walking and faced her.
“Mr. Farrell,” she deliberately stressed.
His sparkling blue eyes grew wide with sudden amusement. Then he threw back his head and roared with laughter.
“What’s so funny?” She impatiently tapped her foot on the floor. Any second, she was out of there, any second.
“Come on, admit it. You still want me to participate in your research. Yet you refuse to acknowledge that we’ve just gotten past phase one.”
“Phase one?” she repeated, glaring at him from the corner of her eyes in defiant confusion.
“The formalities. The awkwardness. The prim-andproper front you’ve put on since you walked through the door.”
“That’s it!” she howled. “I’m gone!”
She almost dropped her briefcase in her scurrying to grab the door handle. Forget impressing the university administration. She would not be insulted by this gargantuan man!
She rushed out of his house, almost tripped on one of the porch steps, but finally made it to her Valiant. She had to get away from him—far, far away. But her driver’s door was stuck, and she couldn’t get it open.
“I hate this old car!” she bellowed as she unsuccessfully tugged and tugged to release the door.
Suddenly, Zane was beside her wanting to help. The heat of his body only inches away radiated against hers.
“Don’t try so hard, Rachel,” he whispered as if he was talking more about the interview than the car door.
With a click and a turn, he unlocked the driver’s door with great ease, which further infuriated her. He was about to politely hold it open for her, but she pushed past him into the car.
“Thank you,” she seethed as she slammed the door closed. Her face felt so hot with anger she felt ready to burst like a balloon.
She started up her Valiant. It belched out a cloud of charcoal smoke that practically surrounded her entire car.
“Professor, your car is screaming for an oil lube,” Zane called out. “I can recommend an excellent mechanic—”
“No way!” she cut in, needing badly to get back to State University, her apartment, the Los Angeles Zoo, anywhere but near Zane Farrell!
Two (#ulink_3a6a47a9-699b-55af-a472-016998092f16)
The moment Rachel’s car zoomed away, he rushed back up the stairs to the master suite. He threw off his clean duds and grabbed his oil-stained coveralls and work shirt.
Johnny Wells never meant to fool Rachel Smith. But he had no other choice.
He rushed out of the mansion to Mr. Farrell’s four-car garage. His faded maroon pickup truck looked incongruous parked next to Mr. Farrell’s emerald Jaguar, sparkling black Mercedes and red Porsche sports car.
The heavy metal door to Johnny’s old pickup squeaked as he slammed it closed. He glanced at his callused hands on the steering wheel. Dammit! Black grease was still embedded underneath his fingernails. Had Rachel noticed?
The real Zane Farrell had immaculately clean hands. He’d never had to pick up a wrench or hammer. Why should he? Mr. Farrell could afford to pay workers to do the manual labor for him. Workers like Johnny Wells.
Johnny pressed his boot down harder on the gas pedal as he drove along the curvy narrow roads of Bel Air. His hands perspired on the hot steering wheel. Had Rachel guessed that he wasn’t Zane Farrell? He’d really messed up with the Yale thing. He knew zip about master’s or miss’s degrees.
The last thing Johnny wanted was to screw it up for Mr. Farrell. He highly respected the man. And when he’d agreed to house-sit for Mr. Farrell, Johnny had also made a special promise to him…a promise he didn’t dare go back on.
As he zipped his truck out of the exclusive community of Bel Air, he took a deep satisfying breath of normal workingman air. No way did he feel comfortable in posh surroundings. Sure, it was a blast playing the role of a multibillionaire. He didn’t mind playacting as Mr. Farrell with the real estate broker who’d come to the mansion door, or the homeowners’ insurance guy who’d come by for an appointment Mr. Farrell had forgotten. He’d proudly pulled off both encounters without a glitch.
But for some mysterious reason, his gut burned like a blazing fire, knowing he’d lied to Professor Rachel Smith.
To Johnny, telling the truth was synonymous with being a solid honorable human being. And with Rachel, pretending to be Zane Farrell somehow felt low and dirty.
Johnny jammed on his brakes for a red light on Sunset Boulevard. He was right next to the university campus where Rachel worked.
Johnny felt a slow grin lighten his face. Rachel Smith was definitely not the professor he’d imagined she would be.
On the phone with her, he’d envisioned a high-nosed academic with an uppity attitude, stiff demeanor and brisk manner. But the second he’d yanked open Mr. Farrell’s front door to greet her, he’d smelled intoxicating gardenia perfume in the air.
Rachel’s soft velvet-brown eyes made him want to stargaze forever. Her silken chestnut hair was pulled tight in a bun, and he’d ached to release her tresses and run his fingers through the smooth strands.
He’d immediately sensed a soft vulnerability about her and felt the instant urge to hold her protectively in his arms.
When she’d spoken about the sexuality study, his gaze was trained to lips which were like flaming red rosebuds ready to be parted with his kiss.
A blaring car horn awakened Johnny to the now-green light on Sunset Boulevard.
He bitterly laughed to himself. Why fool himself? He was definitely no match for Professor Rachel Smith. Once she knew who he really was, she’d immediately take a rocket flight to Venus to get clear of him.
Rachel was from a universe of higher education, renowned books of literature, knowledge of calculus and scientific theories, the privileged world of the scholarly. Zane Farrell’s cosmos. But Johnny Wells? He didn’t even graduate from high school.
He angrily pushed down the accelerator for a sharp curve. His tires made a screech as if in protest to who he really was.
Why did Mr. Farrell have to volunteer for that sex study, anyway? Johnny had no idea what the man’s sexual attitudes were. He certainly didn’t want to make him sound like a fizzled dud in bed. Yet, he couldn’t portray him as a worldly stud, either. He had to find an acceptable sexual image for the man.
Because Johnny owed Mr. Farrell. He owed him big-time. If it wasn’t for Mr. Farrell, Johnny would have remained a runaway teenager on the streets of Los Angeles and maybe ended up with a nowhere life.
It was Mr. Farrell, through his chauffeur, George, who found him on the streets and placed him in a private group home for teens. It was Mr. Farrell who had George enroll Johnny in an auto mechanic’s course to professionally learn the kind of work Johnny felt natural doing.
It was Mr. Farrell who had put up the money for a loan for the automotive repair shop that Johnny had dreamed of owning, though Johnny had fought the idea the whole way. He wasn’t one to take from anybody, especially someone like Mr. Farrell, whom he’d never even met.
When Johnny requested to meet Mr. Farrell face-to-face, George had immediately told him no. He said Mr. Farrell avoided direct contact with everyone. He refused all social invitations. He lived in total isolation. He never left the grounds of his huge mansion except when he traveled alone. And he would only communicate with Johnny through George.
Johnny tried to figure the man out. He couldn’t understand why an eccentric person like Mr. Farrell would shed such kindness upon him. When he asked George, he learned that Mr. Farrell’s only son had had a bad drug problem, and one night during a drug deal, he was fatally shot in the head. His son’s brutal death had devastated Mr. Farrell. Divorced and alone, Mr. Farrell had spotted Johnny as a runaway teen, and George said that Mr. Farrell wanted to give to Johnny what he’d neglected to give his own son.
Johnny vowed to pay back Mr. Farrell every cent and more. Unbeknownst to Mr. Farrell, Johnny even kept a secret bank account with hard-earned money he was saving to pay back his benefactor for every favor Mr. Farrell had ever done for him. Yes, Johnny owed Mr. Farrell, and he’d never let the man down, not ever.
So when Mr. Farrell asked him over the phone to housesit while he went on a relaxing worldwide tour, Johnny immediately said yes. And when Mr. Farrell indicated that he’d also given his entire personal staff a vacation but didn’t want any corporate competitors to know he was gone, Johnny said he’d make sure even the president didn’t know he was away.
But Mr. Farrell had another idea. He asked that Johnny “be him” during any unfinished business he’d forgotten before leaving the country. Even though Johnny wasn’t sure if he could pull it off, he didn’t hesitate to accept Mr. Farrell’s request. Especially when Mr. Farrell told Johnny that he considered him “family” and trusted him implicitly to make all the right business decisions for him.
Johnny steered his pickup into the small parking lot of his shop. His chest expanded with pride as his sign came into view, Johnny’s Foreign Automotive Repairs. He loved the black grease of that place, the oil smell, the grime. It was his business, his power in the world.
“Yo, Johnny baby!” called out Tito, his South American mechanic. Tito ran toward Johnny with a face smeared with car oil.
“Tito, any problems while I was gone?” Johnny asked as he turned off his engine. Loyal Tito had been with him from the start.
“You just missed a call from Mr. Farrell,” Tito told him with a Spanish accent.
“Man, oh, man, where the hell’s my luck?” Johnny bellowed, running frustrated fingers through his curly hair. “I’ve got to talk to him. He’s got me involved in a sex study.” Johnny gave Tito a quick rundown on the university project.
“Maybe you should not have made that promise to Mr. Farrell,” Tito remarked.
“Tito, I had to—”
“But you have never met the man, Johnny,” Tito cut in. “Sure, he helped you in life, but why has he not allowed you to see him? He either talks to you on the phone or through George. He does his business on a computer notebook, cellular phone or through his communications people. Nobody knows who the man is.”
“I know him, Tito,” Johnny said without a doubt in his head. “He’s a private man. He has no wife and no kids to depend on. And he asked me to do him a big favor. And I’m going to do it, Tito, no matter what.” “But how can you, Johnny, when you are not him?” Tito shook his head with confusion.
“I can do it, Tito,” Johnny said. “Mr. Farrell’s never revealed his age to anyone. Nobody’s ever seen his face—”
“Someone will discover you are not Mr. Farrell,” Tito cut in. “Somebody you do not want to find out.”
